Hey guys, Ive written on here a few time about learning to tig weld and tips and tricks of the trade and I have another one for you guys. I'm buying a miller tig and was gonna order and sheet of 11 or 12 guage aluminum to practice running beads on. I've here it's some of the best tig practice you can get, Ive also herd How hard tig welding is and how hard tig welding aluminum is. Would I be crazy to think trying to tig weld and lean on aluminum for the first time would be a good idea. Or am I just setting my self up for failure. If the aluminum isn't a good idea whats good practice

 

It doesn't matter weather you learn on aluminum or steel. Practice is practice, when I first learned in school I wasn't very good at mild steel so my teacher gave me aluminum to try and I picked it up pretty good. Now I weld steel WAY better than aluminum because I practice with it more. They weld a lot different but you will want to be good at both so I def. don't think it matters what you try first Another thing to mention is aluminum is more forgiving of running a ton of stringer beads on the same plate where cold rolled steel tends to get a lot of scale and deteriorate after a few passes. I am a student Instructor for the Tig class at my community College so I see first timers struggle with the process everyday, Hope this hleps

 

first time i picked up a torch i did aluminum, to this day i prefer working with aluminum over steel. just make sure you get lots of practice with both.

 

Normally I tell people to enroll in a welding class at your local community college or what not. I know I learned a lot in the classes I took, really gave me a good basis to start with.

And you get to try out different machines which is good when you go to buy one. Because you know what to look for.