What are the bolts made of? Are the bolts in contact with the acrylic when you're welding? Stainless welding is a real art, not the place to learn. Start out with low carbon steel and practice a while. If you've got bolts, why not use the threads?

Hi TVP45: Not for sure what the bolts will be made of. If I can get my hands on SS316 that would be excellent, otherwise they will most likely be SS304. Do you know of a supplier for SS316 hardware? All welding will be done before the unit will be assembled and placed in the acrylic container. The welding will actually take place at the corner of the 8" x 10" SS316L plate where the 1" x 8" SS316L strip connects. My grandfather was a welder and as a child I observed him work his trade; therefore many years later when I needed to build some support ramps for heavy equipment to traverse up and down a 3 ft wall, I felt confident at building the ramps. They worked very well; of course I over engineered them, like I normally do anyway. I never saw him work with SS and that is why I am asking a few questions. The reason why I am not going to rely on the threaded connections is because Hydrogen is so volatile. My design will be stepping up the voltage into the many thousands of volts and therefor I want to take every precaution which I can to avoid catastrophe. You may say, "Then, why don't you pay to have them welded by some one who does it all the time?" Trust me, if I see that the welding does not look like an excellent job, I will scrap the test pieces and pay for a Pro. I love to do things myself. I have vary high quality standards. Would appreciate it if you would answer a few of my questions. Can a Hydrogen torch work? It is capable of achieving 5000 deg's. So I have to be cautious to not burn through the SS316 pieces. Or should I rent an Oxygen / Acetylene rig or an Arc welder? What type of metal should the spool or welding rod be? Will flux be needed?
Thanks for you time and thought.
Looking forward to your response.
Hydro

Hi Hydro,

Seems, you are staunch, self made person. Appreciate that and respect the feeling. What I feel you should do is!! first of all, Arc electrodes are quiet suitable for your application. Need not think of going for any hydrogen or Oxy / Acty, torch or any other means for joining, as what arc electrode will deliver, other source may not. Secondly, am taking this graned that the welding power source you have is of good quality. Thirdly, now the main criteria of selecting an SS 316L electrode. You can buy electrodes with AWS 316L coding , having main composition of Mn:.70 - 2.0% max., Si: 1.0% max, Cr: 17.0 - 20.0% , Ni: 11.0 - 14.0% and Mo: 2.0 - 3.0% with C: down around to .04% max.

Now this selection prevails only if you have an idea that the bolts are of SS 316L grade. if you are not sure. Try joining with SS 309 Mo type electrodes [C:.10% max, Mn: 1.0 - 2.5% max, Si: .30 - .70% max, Cr: 22.0 - 25.0% max, Ni: 12.0 - 14.0%max,and Mo: 2.0 - 3.0 % max, one can also have little of Cu: .75% max. This composition is very well readily available with all electrodes manufacturing companies, locat a reliable source near you and you can buy appropriate dia as suitable for your job [suggestive 2.50mm x 350mm]

Hope it works.

Hi Rajiv:

Your comments are appreciated.

I want to thank you vary much for the excellent information, which you have supplied me. This is exactly what I needed to accomplish what I am going to do.

Again,

Thank you vary much,

Hydro

If you are trying to build a HHO system. You may want to go to this web page, because these guy's seem to be on the right tract. I havn't built one yet, but it is the best one I have seem so for.The way they did the ss plates may help you.

www.smacksboosters.com

Hi Snewsome:

I am familiar with Smack's approach. Yes he does sell a kit for just $170.00 and you can assemble it. I believe it is a nicely made product for the price and he is using stainless steel cover plates for his cell. You can buy the plates at Home Depot. It is vary interesting, although not the approach I am interested in. He is quite an interesting character to watch and I appreciate all of his efforts in helping us get out of our dependency on Fossil Fuel.

Thanks,

Hydro

Hello, I am trying to imagine this set up in my head and was wondering what are the thicknesses of your 316 material? This will have a huge bearing on what will be the best way to weld it. If you have plates that are 1/8" or thicker then it may be possible to arc weld them. You would have to be very careful not to just arc through and make a big mess with any thing thinner than 1/8" Oxy Acetylene will not work on stainless very well in that you will get the whole piece to hot and it will oxidize and the weld quality would be very low. I would suggest GMAW (Tig) welding 1/32" diameter tungsten sharpened to a point. on straight polarity current, with pure argon shielding gas and a 1/16" or 3/32" ER316 or ER316L welding rod. The problem with this set up for someone that is not an experienced welder and the fact that you only need to use it for a small project would be the high cost of the equipment and training needed. It is my opinion that you should probably get a pro to do the welding or figure out a way to bolt the items together. To bad you are not near north Georgia, USA so I could just weld them for you.

pipewelder

Hi Pipewelder:

The thickness of the SS316L will be either 18 gauge .048 or 16 gauge .060.

May take you up on that welding, since I am in Atlanta area; although would like to do some of the welding also. At least give it a try. Right now I am in the design aspect of the project. I will be using nuts and bolts during the test and development phase. Once I am satisfied with the configuration, then I will be looking to weld the plates and strips together for the production Hydrogen Generator. You can contact me at HydroRamPac@aol.com if you would like to have more personal communications and pass phone numbers.

Thanks,

Hydro

Dear Hydro

With due respect to the suggestions, from PIPE WELDER, I appreciate that, TIG welding is ultimate solution for any alloy welding, and shielding with ARGON, eliminates almost any mistakes of pin holes. The only matter that makes me wonder on the comment is the cost of machine, that PIPE WELDER suggested, so far as your thickness is concerned, any inverter [IGBT - Mosphate] base machine would deliver best weldability to your job. For thinner metals as yours, any inverter base rectifier machine is the best, as that has two options with the same machine. Firstly, you can opt for TIG with lowest possible ampere output, [as low as 10amp] and secondly, you can also do MMA [Manual Metal Arc welding] This will be like hitting two apples with single shot. Hydro, I hope you do have similar resources with you. If not, possess it, as it will be very useful to you on longer run, counting your self made image.

Thank you, Hydro,

Thank you, Pipe Welder

RAJIV DAMANI

Hi Rajiv:

Again you provide excellent information for which I can use. Do you have any welder models which you prefer that would meet my needs that would be cost effective? I did a few google searches and saw various welders. On ebay I found the following welder.

160 AMP ARC DC TIG / ARGON WELDING WELDER IGBT INVERTER

http://cgi.ebay.com/160-AMP-ARC-DC-TIG-ARGON-WELDING-WELDER-IGBT-INVERTER_W0QQitemZ230275111227QQihZ013QQcategoryZ67064QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Were you suggesting a welder like this one or do you have another one in mind?

Thanks,

Hydro

Hi Rajiv:

While I was driving into the parking lot of church this morning, the thought struck me.

Change the plate design to include the strap; therefore no welding will be required. There will be a 1/10 lose of chargeable plate surface to accomodate the new design. My original plan was to build the plates 8" x 10". What I am thinking of is a plate would be like the capitol "L". Now I will check with the SS supplier to see if there is a problem cutting the plates 8" x 9" ,with the 1" wide by 8" strap left on the plate. Excuse the drawing below, just trying to show you how the plates would look.

....

.1".

.X .

.8".

. ..................................................

. .

. 8" X 9" .

. .

. ...................................................

The sheetmetal shop will need to be able to cut 2 plates out of a piece 10" x 16". They will be working with 1 sheet 5' x 10". That should yeld 84 "L"plates, plus 6 plates at 8" x 9" rectangles no tabs. Also will be working with a 4' x 4' sheet of SS, which should yeld 24 "L" plates, plus 4 plates 8" x 9" rectangles no tabs.

Thanks again,

Hydro