My company dispatched my apprentice and I to an oil processing plant on the west cost for a crack repair on an oil heater treater. When we arrived in house staff was pulling this E-tube out and washing it for us. During the first inspection inspections a small crack on the exterior side was noticed on the toe of existing weld. After pulling washing and reinspecting a 21” crack was discovered on the back side.
I had E-tube propped up in the best possible position for ease of access on all sides, CARBON ARCED out the crack on backside . (1/2) deep and a total of 25 “ two inches past the the crack and welded her up with 7018 1/8 .
Next day came back gouged out the front all the way down to sound metal and welded it up on the 3rd day.
Front cracks was just as long as the front crack but dug in a lot deeper.
Base metal 515 grade 70 / 1-1/4 thick.
CAC made short work of joint prep. Joint used was referenced from AWS D1.1 (B-U8) CJP

So I finally broke out the check book and got me a new wire feeder that has a large spool capacity, went to the local home depot and pick up a scrap pice of 1"×1/16 tube and started playing with some low settings.
( linked up with linclon's cross linc really well)
Rather than spend 30 bucks for a bunch of tee joints a decided to make bait hook . It's not finished but my point is the profax vs1 was half the price of an ln 25 and came with a connector lug plus 3' of leed. So far happy with it. Can't wait to try dual shield, Flux and spray arc mood,
Welderskills thanks for the mig workbook and all the recent spray arc videos. 😉

Ripped this 1/8 304 plate with a circular saw I have, not sure if it's the same with any circular saw but it makes short work for sure, no sparks no, no smoke.
Thought it was smart to lay out with my chalk line then spray glue, to keep the line. It work till I had to clean it, oh well it's going straight into the fire box tomorrow anyway 🤪.

Just finished the plate rack I was asked to build.
The steel came from left over drops I saved and, an old hammock stand I built a long time ago but never really used.
2x2x 1/8 tube 15' approximately
2" boiler tube .
12 x12 x 1x8 plate
2 hrs a day round up to 8 hrs
Used the CK to pluse tig weld the ends on the boiler tube (mainly to get familiar with the machine and its settings)
The square tubes were welded with a suit case powered by gas driven welder. (GMAW) Dailing in the wfs can be tricky but I got it.
22v 300 wfs/ volts were higher than the recommended 18 to 19 but, I set higher to make up for the voltage drop.
This was a gift but it's always good to know what I could or should charge.
Any feed back or constructive criticism accepted er I 🤔

Still playing with this pluse tig it's pretty cool but, I could see how using it all the time will be a handy cap.