re: MIG and electronics (long)

[Tessie McMillan <tessmc@domain.elided>]

On Mon, 10 Dec 2001, Mark Battley wrote:

> antiroll bar mounts etc). The Uno steel is much thinner though, creating its
> own challenges for an unskilled welder like me!

	Hey if you've graduated to Italian cars, you're better than me! 
&:-)
> 
> Still puzzled about what to do re electronics, people seem to have quite
> different views. Which may well mean that is doesn't matter too much...
> better safe than sorry though.

	Definitely better safe. Here are two anecdotes: one of my 
instructors -- who with his missing digits and poor eyesight was a great 
poster child for welding safety -- did industrial (mostly marine) welding 
for 20 years after a long stint in the navy (mostly welding). So he tells 
the story of how he and a buddy are out one day, welding this boat. He's 
leaning with his hand on the boat, not too close to the welding location, 
but he's standing there in the rain and pretty soon he realizes his arm
is tingling. If he takes his hand off the boat, his arm stops tingling. So 
the two of them talk about this awhile and finally decide that they need 
to move the grounding clamp from the end of the boat to very close to 
where the welding is taking place. When they do that, he can lean on the 
boat and not feel the tingling. Now granted this was in the rain &:-).
	The second story I heard from my 911/Quattro mechanic one
day when we were discussing welding, because I had just started taking 
classes and we were talking about the really pretty welds on my SSI heat 
exchangers. And you know his shop gets all these guys with no brains but a 
ton of money... well one guy had bought a new 911 and had it welded for 
some reason and it fried the ECU (which is under the driver's seat). They 
hadn't taken the trouble to unplug anything. So it could have been the 
fuse box, it could have been the wiring, it could have been the little 
clamp the box sits in, it could have been anything! And we don't know 
where the ground was or the arc was. But definitely anything with 
sensitive/expensive circuitry should be removed.

Have fun Mark! I'm jealous!

Tess
in Seattle -> now Bellevue WA USA (where I now have a HUGE GARAGE!!!!!!!)

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