A welding electrode means a metal or non-metal rod, which is made of an electrically conductive material. In most cases, it is used to supply a previously defined current value to the product that you will actually weld in the future.
Welding electrodes can be divided into two groups.
- Melting . They are made from special welding wire.
- Non-melting . They are made from rare refractory materials, for example, a special type of tungsten, synthetic graphite, or universal electrical coal.
Using an incredibly complex crimping method, a layer of a certain protective coating is applied over the metal rod, which acts as a metallurgical treatment of the weld pool. In addition, he will also protect it from atmospheric influences and will do everything in his power to at least somehow increase the stability of the arc burning.
The length of the welding rod is between 250 and 450 mm. At the same time, one of its ends must be protected from coating, because in the future it will be attached to a special electrode holder.
Today, manufacturers produce many different brands of electrodes. At the same time, more than half of the entire range consists of so-called consumable electrodes, which are intended mainly to assist in manual arc welding.
The material used to cover the welding electrodes can be made in two main ways.
- dipping.
- crimping.
