Hey guys,

A buddy of mine asked me to weld him a new downpipe, and I'd love to help him out. He needs it to be 2.5'', and super simple. Like 2 90* bends and some straight piping would be fine. Don't know about flanges, haven't thought about em much. But my question is, could I stick weld this with some 6010 and have it hold? I am most comfortable with stick and I know I could lay a solid bead, but would it hold? Also, how thick aprox is the metal people use for this generally? I have never heard about thickness of DIY stuff. I don't want to burn through it.

 

howdy fellow ef-honda member. for every downpipe we've made, which is quite a few, we typically just use exhaust tubing and shoot it with a MIG, but i have done some work with TIG......if you have access to mig, just use that, set it up for thin tubing, and concentrate the "heat" on the flange, and just pull into the tubing a bit.

 

Your rod thickness should be equal to or less than the thinnest material that you are welding. Assuming you'd be using piping that is around 18-16 gage (.049"-.065") you should use a 1/16" (.0625") rod. A E6013 would be a good choice for mild steel, and since it's typically used with A/C it won't concentrate as much heat onto the piece being welded, this should help with burning through. E6013 is also prettier than E6010. Try to keep the rod angle towards the thicker material (flange) so that you can get good penetration on both materials.

Good luck!