welding is characterized by sparks and spatter flying all over the place.

It loo
ks great on movies, but when we are doing the welding we realize spatter is a ba
d thing. It creates more work by increasing clean up time, it wastes material, a
nd it can burn you if you are not wearing the right PPE. It is almost impossible
to eliminate spatter in MIG welding, but we can certainly reduce it by understa
nding what causes it in the first place.
Spatter in Welding
Most of us don t have the option to buy the latest technology in welding equipment
to eliminate spatter. We have to weld with what we have. So we are not going to
talk about how equipment can help eliminate spatter. This list are items that y
ou can change right now and for free.
7 Causes of Spatter:
1. Incorrect settings
procedures that are out of whack will cause spatter. Amper
age, voltage and electrical stick out a crucial.
Amperage:
Amperage in GMAW is determined by your wire feed speed. Running amperage that is
too high will cause spatter. To correct either lower the amperage by decreasing
the wire feed speed or increase the voltage.
Voltage:
Per the above, if your voltage is too low your spatter levels will increase. Inc
rease your voltage until spatter decreases.
Electric Stick Out (ESO):
Electrical stick out is the distance from your contact tip to the work piece. Wh
en mig welding you want to be around 3/4?. A bit more for high amperage. Excessi
ve stick out will increase spatter somewhat, but it will create bigger problems
(porosity due to lack of shielding gas and lack of penetration).
2. Work angle too steep there is a debate on whether pushing or dragging while m
ig welding is the way to go. Regardless of which you prefer make sure your drag
(pull) or push work angle does not exceed about 15 degrees. At times there is no
choice if reach is a problem. But when you can control it do not exceed 15 degr
ees. Steep angles generate a lot of spatter.
3. Surface Contaminants rust, oil, paint and other surface contaminants will cre
ate spatter. Clean surfaces as best as possible prior to welding.
4. Mode of Metal Transfer Short arc and globular transfers are modes of metal tr
ansfer that produce a lot of spatter. To drastically reduce spatter you need to
achieve spray transfer. To do this you need a minimum of 83% argon in your shiel
ding mix (a typical mix would be 90/10). However, you also need to be above the
transition currents for the diameter of wire you are running. Smaller machines w
ill not be capable of this.
5. Erratic Feeding - when the wire feeder cannot feed wire at a constant speed t
here will be fluctuations in amperage that will drastically affect the arc causi
ng a lot of spatter. Make sure you don t have any feeding issues. For help in corr
ecting this problem take a look at Troubleshooting Erratic Wire Feeding.
6. Quality of Consumables - some applications can live with high levels of spatt
er, others can t. In robotic applications and other situations in which wire consi
stency is critical shy away from the cheap-low quality wires. A single spool or
drum may be consistent, but across several spools or drums there may be variatio

ns in wire diameter, copper coating, and chemistry. Unfortunately AWS allows for
such wide range of chemistry that even a coat hanger can be made into a mig wir
e. The best manufactures keep their own ranges and tolerances and thus produce b
etter product.
7. Bad Shielding Gas - This is very uncommon, but shielding gases of low quality
can affect spatter levels. What is more common is mislabeling (i.e. getting a 7
5/25 on a cylinder that has a 90/10 label), but even this is rare. The higher th
e argon content the smoother the arc. 100% carbon dioxide is cheap and provides
good penetration profile, but it creates a lot of spatter.
Finally a word on anti-spatter. Anti-spatter does not eliminate or prevent spatt
er. It simply allows the spatter to slide off the material and not stick to it.
By using excessive amounts you can introduce other problems such as porosity. It
is not bad to use it, but look into what s causing spatter in the first place and
take care of it.