Mig welding gas
I'm just getting into welding, and I'm going to try and learn mig.
Truthfully, I haven't even attempted it yet. I've just been gathering the necessary material and this weekend I thought I had everything I needed.
Unfortunately, me being the ignorant person I am, I got an inert gas tank from a 3rd party and swapped it at my local airgas for a 100% argon tank.
Most of you probably see the problem. I haven't used any of the gas yet, and I'm hoping to be able to swap it back for the blend and pay the difference. However, if I'm unable to I wanna try and come up with some alternative options.
Option 1: I work at a brewery and was hoping our gas supplier would be willing to swap it, but I'm not sure on that.
Option 2: I'm trying to see if a gas blender is feasible, as I already own a CO2 tank. And perhaps I could use the argon tank later for tig welding and get a CO2 tank that isn't beverage grade and be all dandy in that regard.
Option 3: Just buy another tank, I like this option the least as they aren't cheap and that means the argon tank just sits there and collects dust.
Option 4: Just learn how to tig welding first.
What would you do in this scenario?
Keep the argon. It's useful for some forms of mig welding (aluminum mig comes to mind) and it's necessary for tig welding, which imo is a better starting point. Tig teaches you how to watch the puddle without all the smoke and sparks of mig/stick to confuse an already hectic process.
Your other main pickup you'll want is oxygen and acetylene. Those let you do torch cutting, gouging, scarfing, torch brazing, and torch welding. All extremely important skills for the home gamer. MIG is good when you have to process a lot of one specific material or another. TIG and torch welding are going to be able to cover wide ranges of materials with minimal adjustment.