Stick Welding Rods and a lot More 

I know this comment comes 4 years later, but this and the first video of this 2 part series explained the best about how to use the electrodes that I have been practicing with as a self taught hobby welder. As a seasoned welder, you have shared the real tricks and tips that are needed for the self learner to become better as they learn. Thanks Jodie for this and your other videos.

Thank YouJodi for your expert technique and teachings on producing expert and master welders all over the world. Your videos are always positive, encouraging, and straight to the point which I can speak for a lot of welders when I say this (We Need)!! So, thank You again and continue to keep posting more and more videos to help keep the Arc Family ALIVE and STRONG! By the way just so you know, your videos helped take me from the bottom of my class to the top of my class in welding school (3.6 H.C.C Welding Program 2014 Graduate) Thank You and I'm still continuing to learn the ways of a Master Welder. Stay Blessed!!!

Without question, these are the best how-to videos on any subject out there today. Thanks for a great series.

Hi Jody, Excellent to see all the rods laid by the same person in the same video, easy to compare and make up an idea about the different apps for each of them. Thanks again, Pierre

3 months of night school in 15 minutes! Jodie, your a legend! Thanks Mate! ( from Oz )

7014 is my go to rod for everyday projects, 7018 is my second favorite.

Restored my faith in 6011 ! Good job Jodi !

Jody Ive been watching your videos for the past few months. I am not a welder but am starting a 5 week MIG course tonight as I'd like to know the basics for a few projects I have in the works. Namely a new frame for one of my little Boler trailers. Your videos are informative and put together well. I know the work involved in photographing and editing and I'm sure your spend more time putting the videos together than on the actual welding. It is a lot of work and is appreciated. Keep up the good work.

This video needed to be made! My Ag teacher in high school knew I wanted to be a welder. He handed my a box of firepower 6013 rods, we had old Lincoln AC tombstones. He told me "If you can run this rod and make it look good you will do great in welding school. He was completely right. The most common thing I hear on jobsites is "6013 is the hardest rod to run correctly" I'd agree. They are also amazing rods to weld thin metal with. My dad wanted some thin metal welded. I looked through my box, found a old 10lb box of "Hot maxx 3/32 6013" not advertising but they did run good for the 7 dollars I payed for them. I think I had my Lincoln tombstone on 75 amps, got great penetration, every other rod blew through it at operation temperature. weldingtipsandtricks I'd love to see you weld a pipe coupon with all AC rods on AC polarity and see if you can make a X-ray weld from 6011's and 6013's. I think it'd be very interesting,I've never even tried putting a root in anything with 6011's they don't seem to penetrate as well as 6010's. I feel like if you made a video about that it'd go viral through the welding community, it's something I've never seen or heard of being done. Of course in a real life situation I'd never 1. Weld pressure pipe with AC polarity. 2.put a root in with a 6011, or 3. use a slag infested 6013 to fill and cap, but I still really do think that'd be interesting. I've watched you since I was a high schooler dreaming about welding, now I'm on job sites time flies. I still learn a ton about tig welding from you since I work at mostly Steel mills/ paper mills. All scratch start ran off a Lincoln 300 where I go. 2% thoriated tungsten. Much respect from a "New guy"

Brings back memories. In the mid 80's in the United Kingdom the only welder you could legally have was an AC stick welder. They simply would not let you rent oxy-acetylene without a contractors license! My first car was rusted to heck and I welded the whole thing back up using nothing but 1/16th 6011 rods.. I was a really good amateur welder back in those days..:)

I only have a buzzbox, your videos have been a lifesaver for my little home shop.

Jodi, grateful for all of your series of videos.... Has taught me so much. THANK YOU! Have a blessed day.

Congratulations for your patience and knowledge!! Happy new year and tanks gor your tips and trics. Jose from Uruguay!!

Excellent basic explanation of the most common rods and their uses. The amp setting given in the videos is a good base to start with.

Thanks for taking your time to make videos like this one. I have come a long way since my first Lincoln tombstone buzzbox with 7018 trying to fix an axle and hubs that had stripped splines on a honda 250x four wheeler. That weld was the ugliest thing I had ever seen so I took it to a shop called The Metal Hospital. The welder made a flawless weld and it bugged me that mine didn't look like that. That is what got me into welding and 12 years later I can honestly say that I still learn a thing or two from these videos you do.

love all your videos been welding for 30+ years but never pass a chance to watch anyone weld you never what you might learn!!

The "go to" guy for expert explanation and technique questions! Thank you!

I love all your video's! I love to learn new welding tips and techniques and you are the go to youtube man for that! Thanks for taking the time to put these video's together for everyone. I surely appreciate it!

This was useful information I have ran alot of different rods but for me I have always had more success with 6013 for general welding. I always have issues when running 6010 and 6011 as it seems can never maintain control of the puddle. But I am self taught never had any schooling just learned on the job. I worked in oilfields so had every situation you can imagine to deal with. My hardest test was using nickel rod to weld a case hardened steel pipe collar to a cast air compressor attachment that was going to pump gas into a high pressure pipeline. Gas under heat, high pressure and constant vibration and having a leak wasn't an option. But I got the job done it never broke or leaked ran for years till it got shut down. I always use 7018 when doing filler work but it just doesn't work for me as a root rod for that I have always had more luck with 6013.

Another great video. I just bought 2 of your TIG fingers and am looking forward to trying them out.

Best informative welding videos on RU-vid

Happy new year to you and family Jody. Thank you for the videos this past year. Happy dayz

Thank you Jody. You have helped me a lot over the years. Enough to tackle a broken bushing with a 1 inch shaft that could not be dissembled. Bruce (amateur)

7:58 I did that at school with a 7018 and it blew my friend's mind

Excellent information. Very well delivered and easy to comprehend for newbies like my self. Thanks so much.

fleetweld 180 is a superior rod in the 60k series, thats all I will use, superior penetration and burns through contamination better. 6013 is only good for very thin, clean welds, with technique 180 is still better. Will nearly pass cert. by itself and sometimes has.

Thanks mate for your videos. My ability to use my powerarc is so much better since watching your videos.

i like this guy so much! best welding videos on the web!

Thanks for that info! Been wondering what the numbers were for and what they meant. Now I know and saved this for when I need it again.

I absolutely love the way you teach the material. So well done, thank you!

Hey Jody! I'm shure that i watched everyone of your videos at least 5 times!!(A LOT!) and this really made me a better welder! So therefor a lot of thanks!! I'm shure after making so many videos it must be hard to think of new stuff? Because i've watched every video i know that you never made one of welding pipe SCH10! I don't know if that type of pipe is used in USA because i never found someone making a video of welding this! I work in the refrigeration (NH3) busines and we almost always use SCH10. So maybe you can make a video how you would approach x-ray TIGwelding SCH10? But the small pipes like 1/2inch-1inch carbon/stainless they are sometimes really difficult!! I experimented a lot with heat input like puls or using a 3mm filler rod gap or no gap risk of overcooking...But i can't find a good technique that's consistend. When you go bigger in pipe like 4inch there isn't mutch difference with SCH40/SCH80. I'm shure this will help a lot of people in this part of the world! A big thanks for all your work! Happy holydays! regards from Belgium!

I’ll be keeping this video for reference. Thank you.

Excellent video as usual. Keep it up Jody!

Very good channel, thank you for your tutorials.

Another great video, Cheers! If I could request anything it would be welding out returns and transitions in structural shapes with stick, always a key area that gets picked on by inspectors.

Hey Jody, Someone mentioned covering duty cycles, which has a certain element of importance. But more so, in my opinion is to cover application. What rod to use because of a particular application, ie.. making a shelf vs. welding up a repair on a trailer. Point is, you know as well as I do, you can't just use any rod for any purpose! Razor!

Love your videos!!! Keep them coming plz! And happy new year :)

thank you for sharing all of your knowledge of welding I've learned a lot from you and I really love welding now

Now I know what those numbers mean. Thank you! Excellent video.

7018 @ 6010 are my favorite rods to use.

Thank you for your great videos!

For just basic repair welding, if the metal is clean, easy to get to and I'm not worried about the rod sticking I use 7018 because it's stronger and cleaner. If the metal is rusty, hard to get to or I'm worried about sticking I use 6011. If you are welding something where you are having to insert the rod through other machine parts or whatever and the rod sticks, you can't whip it back and forth to break it loose so you don't want a rod prone to stick.

🥰 Love your videos learned a lot thank you Keep up the great work Teachers like you are a dying breed

Thanks for the video, I see this and follow some tips for Metal Carpentry Tube. Greetings from Chile.

In the midwest the 6011 rods are called "farmer sticks" because they will weld thru dirty or rusty metal. We use them alot for fencing with sucker rod and recycled oil field pipe.

I didn't know that 6010s didn't work well with some inverters. I tried Hobart 6010s on my lincoln squarewave tig 200 and it kept sticking but 6011s and 7018s were great.

Note: I knew a fairly good pipe welder. He didn't know what those numbers meant!!

Awesome vid Jody, as always very explanitive ( hope that's a word) !!☺ if someone has trouble learning after watching your videos , they may wanna look for a different profession!! 😏

Awesome information and nice description

Awesome overview of the different rod types, sizes and characteristics! Do you have any suggestions on where to find plate for practicing?

1/16 3/32 and 1/8th 6011 and 3/32 7018 is Basicly my go to for all projects.

thank you for the videos,,

You sir,,,,,are the man,,hands down. I've the tombstone buzz box and like the reference to it at every opportunity. Needless to say, I'm really late to this party. I have a newer something stick welder. Been told needs an Exciter.. know anything about this? Many thanks.. I will watch the vijayo several more times and take notes.

hey, love the videos can't wait to try whip and pause technique for my next troublesome root. A quick suggestion for your audio commentary recording; check out the blue yeti microphone. you can get it at best buy pretty cheap and has excellent audio quality that most you tubers take advantage of. Also to get rid of "pops" on your b words and p words you can get a pop filter at any music store for 5$. Excellent work! keep it up!

I like this video, I work at a plant we generally use e6013, I don't like it very much but they don't buy e7018 & e6010 as much so we don't have much options. Would be nice if you do a video on e11018 though!

Hi Jody-when you're propping the thin rods and you say they get hot-wouldn't a TIG finger help? LOL! Cheers!

very good video..thanks a lot

Another great video. 6013 are nice to use once you've got used to them it's the most common rod here in the uk for general fabrication. i like the easy striking! But you can buy a 6013 rod that is specifically for virtical down welding???? Is there no numbering for this type of rod????

Hi, there's a question that's been going around in my head about stick electrode storage, specifically 7018. Are they required to be kept in an oven for ALL applications, or just for certain jobs such as something that gets X-rayed, etc.? Thanks.

Another great video jody. Here's an idea... how about a video(s?) about what NOT to do when welding, and what mistakes look like? I think it would be a good way to diagnose bad beads.

Watched both part 1&2. I have an old style thunderbolt. I took a 200 hour class at the Voc college about 20 years ago, mostly stick, some mig, gas, and tig. But as it was a short class we focused only used DCEP from the schools industrial grade machines and only two rods(don't recall which). My question is when would you choose AC over DC on a selectable machine? And for those with limited machines, would fill passes be better with a thicker low amp rod or a slim high amp rod? (that is 3/32-7024, 1/8-7018 and 5/32-6013 or 6011 are all in the 130amp ballpark but very different in mass)

hi Jodi don't know if it's your camera angle but when you go from right to left you seem more closer to a 90 degree angle but when you go the other way you seem to be on almost a 15 degrees angle. Not sure if that is how you weld or the camera just seems to long arc more when you go left to right makes a big difference especially on 6013 rods as to how the look and penetrate we use 6013 rods on open button horizontal vertical flat and get a nice evening weld on both sides once you tune in your angles speed and amperage but in Australia we don't use 110 volt you would need a step down transformer here some of your settings seem very hot but we are using 240 volt 50/60hertz here great info as always cheers

Thanks Jody!

@11:30 machines have different power pulse cycle widths ( duty cycle) supplying the stick so the actual power delivered will be different for each machine. Cheaper machines typically have lower pulse times ( less power) . Eg my portable stick runs at 22.8 volts and 70amps but at 60% duty cycle = 70Amps peak. I imagine cheaper machines may do this differently.

hey jodi nice vids. I just happen to use 6011 on my exhaust pipes. it runs great on my ac suit case( Campbell hausfeld) welder. 7014 5/64 runs a little better. but I have found the 7018ac by Lincoln is excellent on the tombstone welder I have. try some and make a video!

Great Video! Thanks!!

Several times you have referred to keeping 7018 rod in a rod oven. In this video you talked a little about refreshing old 7018 in the rod oven to re-dry them. Wondering how many times you can get away with this before the rod is compromised. Great stuff BTW, as Eddie Murphy would say, "Merry New Year"!

Hello, thank you for the useful tips on how to arc weld, here is my question: i have a arc weld borrowed from my brother, i am taking the task to weld portions of the frame on my 83 cj7 jeep. what rod would be best to use to weld the frame together. (cutting one piece out and welding another from a donor frame)

I been watching so many of your videos from 6/7 years ago and the information is so good and the quality of video is great compared to a lot of others the same age. Would you consider doing a video on electrode brands. The prices seem to vary pretty widely but does the quality of electrode actually change as much?? Do they make any difference or what situations would or wouldn’t they be necessary? Thanks for all your time and info.

I just started welding like 3 days ago and I'm so addicted for one thing I found that works really good since I'm a mobile mechanic and I have plenty of them are rotors these are good to practice on

would love to see a video on engine driven welders

Thanks buddy.wanted to ask when you were welding with the 6013 rod on the 1.1mm sheet metal,is the video speed up or is that the actual travel speed of the rod?. Many thanks

Jodi, I'm hard faced the teath on my backhoe bucked. Now I decided to build them up more with 7018. Do I need to grind the hardfacing off first?

Muito bom seus vídeos!! Parabéns!! Gostaria de saber quanto custa uma mesa dessa.

I learned on 7018. Lincoln tombstone and was pretty nice welds. Now I can't glue 2 pieces together if I tried.

Great video! Would a stick welder be good for fabricating BBQ smokers/trailers? If so, what amps would be best? Thx!

Newbie here trying to learn welding by making cages for our dogs. was wondering if its better to use 6011 or 6013 for 1" angle irons or 1x1 square tubing.

Hi friend. Very interesting video! I'm very interested in welding after watching Essential Craftsman video about it! I would like kind of a comparison video between welding VS bolting. You must know there are companies that sell/ship ready to assemble metal structures to anywhere. These structures are for shops, industrial businesses, etc. so they are small and big. The buyer then has to assemble it by bolting each piece together. I was wondering if, for the same kind of structures, welding or bolting had [strength wise] some advantages or disadvantages worth knowing. That could make someone make a choice. I think by making an structure for bolting, it could be made as a pre fabricated one; ready to assemble by the buyer. Anyway. I hope to get some input on the subject :) Thank you!

using 6013 2.5mm rods on a 200mm t joint ive cooked my rods at 100degrees to make sure theres no moisture and using angle about 30 to 45 at 100amps yet slag is hard to chip of and keep getting the odd inclusions if not on the first pass I get it on third pass any advise

can you make a video about what dig is good depending on the thickness of the metal?

6013 rods are commonly used here .in the uk because a lot of the so called welding suppliers only stock these rods so you have to use what you can get. even at college it was all 6013 rods because they are er........ cheap. give a lot of so called welders a 6011 rod over here and they say "these rods are rubbish" I got some Hobart 6011 rods and I had to order them from usa or pay a silly amount of money because they would be a special order. some people are realy good with 6013 because they have to. I could never weld a plate to 2" angle iron on on the inside and have it look good. any ideas? I have tried welding the outside first and wrapping leads around things but no luck. ac works ok though but you don't always have an ac welder to hand. keep up the good work

New to stick welding.sure is steep learning curve. way too many variables. Mig is so easy

Hi, Jody, what amperage did you use to weld with the 1/16 rods?

Have you ever tried a ESAB or a Kemppi stick welder? If so, how are they holding up compared to a Lincoln or a Hobart?

Hi Jody! Can you say anything about a 6012? Ive seen those last time i was at the local welding supplier Thx!

Lol Here's the video summary Flat pad. Flat pad. Thin joint. Flat pad. 6g out of position root pass for funsies @14:52. Flat pad. Like it's no big deal. You're a monster!

2:30 and crap pay I'll bet. Been there, done that. One place had exposed insulation. Flammable. I didn't know til one day it caught fire. Unfortunately the other workers had brought beer and were drinking when that occurred.

I don't think you mentioned brands here much but I saw it and I wanted to ask what you thought of those blue demon rods. I have a good opinion of their fast freeze rods but I haven't used their 7018. I'm not sure anyone will ever make a better one than lincoln, but I would like to know what anyone thinks about them compared to, say, hobart 7018. Again, I like hobart rods in general and actually prefer their 6011 over anyone, but I just can't get the hang of their 7018 and want another "low cost" alternative to the excalibur Thanks for your time!

at welding school, while welding uphill groove plate weld (DOT test) useing 7018 with a power mig 300 lincoln. "i think" 120 amps was super hot neeed to turn down. on here i thinkyou say 140 was a little cold with the thounder bolt. was welding 3/8 plate maybe thicker ??

Great vid PERIOD.

What rod do u suggest for welding unistrut and the amp range when arc welding?

what kind of filter are you using for the camera to keep safe the sensor ?

hi love your shows, please let me know if i can run a 100\60-80 ac rod on my d\c welder as i have never done welding before and brought them by mistake regards bill

Jody, probably the MOST important thing you have taught me is to watch my puddle!!! Since doing that, my welds have improved exponentially! (Except below). Question on the small diameter 6013 rods and sheet metal: I recently attempted to make corner welds such as in your video, but on 22 ga. (0.9mm as opposed to the 1.1mm you used) using 1/16" 6013 rods, around 40 amps on an inverter welder, DCEN for lower penetration and fast movement. I still burned holes in the metal. Even quick tacks sometimes burned holes. What am I doing wrong?

Great sir

Hello, what do you whink about using E308 inox electrode (2,5 mm), to weld 1 mm thick pipe exhoust? I'm feel very good...

Great video ty

Nice videos Do you ship items to mexico ???

Thank you muchly! Sorry my bad English. If afterwards will be possible, show how to Stick Welding pipe coupling, without access from every side. As an example, when pipe located in the corner of wall and ceiling. How to use a mirror, or something else... Huge respect from Russia!

Loved the video, however, I still don't know why I would choose a 7014 or a 6011, for example, instead of a 7018. I've always been told 7018 is for structural projects. Frankly, that makes me want to use it for everything. I built a trailer last year, used a couple different sized 7018AC rods. Pure joy in welding. Welding a log splitter, going to go with 7018. Sawmill, 7018. Steel rack, 7018. Custom gantry crane, 7018. If you have the choice to use 7018, would you ever choose 6011 or 7014 instead?