Why Does My MIG Welder Spatter? A Complete Guide To Find Out

Welding with MIG is all about sparks and spatter flying everywhere. Although it may look cool in movies, in reality, it isn’t delightful. Because, it increases the work of a welder like clean-up time, and it wastes material. Also, if you are not wearing the appropriate PPE, you may burn.

Similarly, it is challenging to eliminate spatter totally. Still, we can reduce it by understanding the fact of why does my MIG welder spatter.

Following that, most of our pocketbooks do not allow us to purchase the technology equipment to eliminate spatter due to a small budget. And, if you have what it takes, you can weld.

Due to this, we won’t prescribe any pieces of equipment to buy to eliminate spatter. However, the following article provides a list of reasons and items to change initially free of charge.

Why Weld Spatter Is A Problem?

Spatter causes several problems in welding processes. Problems include:

• Spatter elements stick to welding material
• Burns welders’ cloth and skin
• Material loss during arc and welding
• Increase cleaning time and hours of work

Why Does My MIG Welder Spatter?

Nowhere we will let you know the actual cause of the weld spatters.You can learn more about how to mig weld beginners on google and in our website. Stick to us to find the reason, and after that, you’ll see a complete guide to reduce spatter from your MIG welder. 

Main Causes And Solutions of Spatter:

Incorrect Welder Settings

A welding process that is out of range of your welding machine will cause a spatter. The main points to conclude are:

Amperage:

The wire feed speed determines the amperage in GMAW. That’s precisely why higher amps cause spatter. In order to solve this issue, you can either lower the wire feed rate or increase the voltage.

Voltage:

Similar to above, the higher the voltage, the higher the spatter. If this happens, increase the voltage level until the amount of spatter disappears. 

Electric Stick Out (ESO):

In welding, electric stick out refers to the area between the contact tip and welding metal. As with the above specifications, the higher the ESO, the greater the chance of spatter. In addition, it leads to other problems such as penetration and porosity due to insufficient shielding gas.

All in all, if you want to maintain ESO and prevent spatter caused by it, change its level until it reaches the level of satisfaction. When welding with MIG, one more thing is to get a recommended ESO of around ¾” and increase the level of amperage.

Steep work angle

On MIG welding, there is an intense debate over pushing it or dragging it. Whatever route you choose, make sure your working angle does not exceed 15 degrees.

You won’t have any spatter problem initially if it is not in your range of reach, but it is excellent practice to do so when it is within your reach. Steep angles do produce a lot of spatters.

Dirty Surface

If the material within the metal and coats covering the surface cause the spatter, dirt is the main suspect of the problem. More so, your surface can be oily, greasy, dusty, or have some pen lines. All of these do not undergo with the weld and cause the spatter.

To solve it, simply clean the surface before welding. As you know that, welding is a simple process that produces minimal spatter when you’ve had done the homework. And it’s a universal truth that cleaning is its important sublime.

Other than that, cleaning doesn’t take too much time. You can simply wipe the surface with a rag before welding, as it will generate minimal spatter resulting in an excellent weld.

Unstable Feeding

A wire feeder that is unstable and cannot feed wire at a constant speed may cause fluctuations in amperage. More so, it affects dramatically, causing a lot of spatters. Therefore, make sure that your machine doesn’t have any feeding problems.

Using Substandard Or Incorrect Components

High-quality components aren’t that expensive, but they’re long-lasting, consistent, reputable, and most importantly, the right fit for your specific metal.

Likewise, low-quality wires vary in diameter as the gun fed these with different speeds. And a fewer quality liner clogs quickly, as well as always choose snug fit consumables.

More importantly, keep in mind that you can not only eliminate excess spatter by using quality products. But they also help in reducing other welding issues.

Low-Quality Shielding Gas

Bad shielding gas is a sporadic occurrence. Still, if you have low-quality hydrogen, you will surely get a spatter. It is common for gas sellers to mislabel cylinders, such as giving you a 75/25 cylinder with a 90/10 label.

Thus, the higher the argon, the smoother and higher quality the arc. Also, 100% CO2 has a meager cost and provides excellent penetration results. However, it produces a large amount of spatter.

That’s It:

Now that you reviewed the requirements, I am sure you have enough information about “why does my MIG welder spatter.” In addition, you can apply all the solutions mentioned above whenever you face a spatter issue.

Finally, thanks for sticking with me until the end. Weld-on!