Hull welding

[Manfred Müllner]

Hi all!

The hull of my carrier is empty and will go to sandblasting soon.

I have some holes in the hull those are not original.
The carrier was formerly used as a snow plow.

I also need to rebuild the front armor.
The side plates are cut near the division plate and need to be supplemented.

I want to know which electrodes I have to use for the best result.
Who can give me some advice?

I found the threads with the informations from the front armor in this forum.
If anyone has more drawings, in what form ever, or parts for the front armor (No 2 MK II*, built 1944), it would be great.

[maple_leaf_eh]

There was a posting a few months ago about the number of carriers being restored in Alberta, Canada. Something like five projects are underway. One of the comments was there was a shop making new armour from newly recreated drawings. Yours might be the same model as the armour. But, the entire Austrian foreign exchange reserves might be expended having a set shipped from Canada! Maybe they will give/sell/release the drawings for a one-time local build in Europe?

[cletrac (RIP)]

Use 7018 low hydrogen rods. That way you keep from getting hydrogen embrittlement at the welds.
Here's the thread mentioned above

[eddy8men]

hi Manfred
I've used normal .8mm mig wire to weld mine with no problems from cracking during cooling, except when welding wading plates on the side when maybe 3 out of 20 welds cracked after cooling but i'm no welding expert I can only tell you of my experience.
good luck with the restoration, it will be nice for you to get the hull after blasting

rick

[RichardT10829]

Normal mig wire will do as Rick says.. Clean out the holes then hit them from both sides, if you wanted to be picky you could counter sink the holes from both sides then fill with weld then dress back nice and flush... Way stronger but for what it is it may be a bit OTT :-)

There was a great deal of work and callaboration on a global scale to produce the front armour DXF's however I have not got a copy myself otherwise it would have been shared by now. I am however able to supply the correct shape headed snaps to re rivet carriers and can do a nice deal on the three shaped snaps required if folk need them.

Manfred I have the side armour DXF's which have the correct positions of all the rivet holes which you will need. Don't be tempted to remove the remains of the armour that you have left... Personally speaking I would just graft in the missing front sections to them, you may need stainless wire in the mig for the job though.

[Stew Robertson]

Like David said use 7018 and if you are filling hole use copper backing plates and you will have no problems