shock from TIG

[wlbrown]

has anyone ever gotten a shock from
doing TIG? once in awhile i would get
a shock from mine, and i talked to an
electrician friend, and he said to run
a wire from the table to a good ground.
i did this, and it is not a problem now.
wlbrown

[Slagman]

I've been shocked a few times. The problem seems to be if you are welding on base material that is laying on a work table and you are grounding the work table instead of the base material. To cure this, you need to put the ground directly onto the workpiece, not on the table that your workpiece is on.

Hope this helps.

Slagman

[Guest]

Yeah, getting shocked is a way of life to the heliarcer. High Freq. will get you quite often...not to worry, it won't kill you...just a bother. You can play the HF arc over your hand if you keep it moving...it freaks out the non weldors!

If you are getting shocked, there's for sure a bad ground...and whilte it is searching for a ground, it can damage (arc-out) a surface of your part.

[Dan]

Only been shocked by it once. Heres the story. Finished the last weld on one side of the project I was welding on. Removed the ground clamp from the structure. My helper and I flipped the structure over and put it back onto my support stands. Then my helper asked me a welding related question that I can t remember now, but it required some visual aid drawings at our dry eraser board on one of the shop walls. This discussion lasted for about 20 to 30 minutes. After this I returned to my project. I positioned myself for the first weld on the other side. Then I pressed the foot pedal to initiate the arc, and I ll never forget the feeling that happened next. I got shocked so hard that it just about knocked me over onto the floor. What happened? Simple answer forgot one important step. Which was to put the ground clamp onto my project. The darn thing was sitting over on the shop table. Oh well, my helper had good laugh from it. That is once he knew I was OK.

[Bob]

Dan left off a ground ... ???
I thought only I did that. Never been shocked. On MIG I just chalk it up to a check the wire feed rollers are not too tight.
Bob

[Hobart Expert Dave]

The best I have seen is leaving the work clamp off but the Table being electrically grounded same as the welder. The arc is struck and yes the welder is welding, Then he starts to smell rubber burning and looks back and his input cable is melting. The ground wire in the cable was pulling weld current and it got very hot. Lesson dont hook the weld table to electrical ground. If you are (and you should) ground your table ground it to a seperate grounding rod.
Dave Evans

[Guest]

As a young production weldor in aircraft part manufacturing, doing heliarc, it got to be a habit to throw the torch into your lap after a weld. We had this one guy who wasn't very accurate in tossing the torch over his leg, and jabbed the tungsten right into his go-nads! OUCH!

I have jabbed it into my leg before, white hot tungsten, and hit the pedal! It took weeks to heal up!

[ZACHV]

Originally posted by Rocky D
... and jabbed the tungsten right into his go-nads! OUCH!

I think a collective moment of silence is appropriate here!

[Hobart Expert Dave]

I saw a guy do this once with a Mig unit. He fliped the gun over the rail he was welding and it hit on the gun trigger and fed right into his nads. Very sadly he went to the company nurse.
Dave Evans

[ZACHV]

...he went to the company nurse.

Did she "kiss it and make it better"?