TIG Welding and Tungsten Electrode

Argon tungsten-arc welding (TIG welding) is kind of welding method, which is under the protection of inert gas, the electrode and metal will produce the arc heat to melt metal and filler wire. And TIG usually uses tungsten electrode as electrode. Inert gases include carbon dioxide, argon and others. Argon as the inert gas does not react chemically with the metal, and they are able to fully protect the metal bath not to be oxidized. In addition, at high temperature argon gas does not dissolve in the liquid metal, won’t easy to produce pores. Therefore, in TIG welding argon is usually as an inert protective gas, and which can obtain high-quality welds. According to the different type of power supply, TIG can be divided into DC TIG welding, AC and pulse TIG welding three types.

In TIG thorium tungsten electrode, tungsten electrodes, cerium tungsten electrodes are generally used. To choose different electrode tpye is generally based on the welding object and different powder supply types. For example, cerium tungsten electrode is mainly used in low-current DC welding, commonly used in small parts welding; Lanthanum tungsten electrode is suitable for AC welding, having excellent welding performance, is the most popular electrode; Thorium tungsten electrode’s performance than tungsten electrode is superior and it is widely used in DC welding area, but because it has a certain degree pollution, so the waste welding head should be well handled; Zirconium tungsten electrodes in AC environment has good welding performance, especially at high load currents, the zirconium tungsten electrode exhibited excellent performance is not a substitute for the other electrodes.

Major equipments of TIG tungsten electrodes include power supply, control box, torch, hydrogen systems and air-conditioning system. TIG welding can be divided to three types according to the operation approach: manual welding, semi-automatic welding, and automatic welding which GTAW (manual welding) is most widely used.

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