1986 Tracker Seacraft 20 budget rebuild

[Jared]

Thank guys. Of the entire project making the gas tank is the only thing I have a little experience in, the rest of the boat is a lot of guess work. Doing the best I can on a tight budget.

[flyingfrizzle]

Very nice indeed on the tank, I am getting ready to do a 90 gallon myself for a friend. Looks like it turned out fairly nice. What welder are you using? I just got a Miller Dynasty 280 with the expansion card about a few months ago and so far it is the cats meow.

[Jared]

Originally Posted by flyingfrizzle

Very nice indeed on the tank, I am getting ready to do a 90 gallon myself for a friend. Looks like it turned out fairly nice. What welder are you using? I just got a Miller Dynasty 280 with the expansion card about a few months ago and so far it is the cats meow.

Nice buy. I have been running a syncrowave 250 for a handful of years at work and added a dynasty 210 last year for something a little more portable. It’s a very nice machine, I would love to have a 280 like yours or 350 for the occasional heavy wall aluminum project I get.

I used 3/32 ER5356 filler, 3/32” 2% thoriated tungsten. Pulsed at 0.7 PPS, 190 amps peak, 30% background voltage, 30% peak time. Balance 65% freq 80H. These are settings I have landed on that make me 75% happy on the .125” 5052 I did the tank out of, but I always feel like something is off a tiny bit to get that last bit of quality I’m looking for.

[flyingfrizzle]

Originally Posted by Jared

Nice buy. I have been running a syncrowave 250 for a handful of years at work and added a dynasty 210 last year for something a little more portable. It’s a very nice machine, I would love to have a 280 like yours or 350 for the occasional heavy wall aluminum project I get.

I used 3/32 ER5356 filler, 3/32” 2% thoriated tungsten. Pulsed at 0.7 PPS, 190 amps peak, 30% background voltage, 30% peak time. Balance 65% freq 80H. These are settings I have landed on that make me 75% happy on the .125” 5052 I did the tank out of, but I always feel like something is off a tiny bit to get that last bit of quality I’m looking for.

I takes a good hand to keep up with the pulser. On mishap and your trying to catch back up. Looks really good judging by the one pic. I like to use pulse on some things and have used it at .7pps going down outside corners like that. Really makes a consistent looking weld. I have got used to having a momentary switch on my ck 20 water cooled rig now and can pulse manually as needed with the button. Doing stuff where it is hard to keep up with a foot petal the micro switch really shines. My father dose anodized T-tops and tuna towers and I learned from him so I guess that's where I picked up on that as most of them guys manually pulse.
I can say one thing I really like that has helped me is the amplitude settings. The dynasty 210/280 has them like the 350/400 if you pay the extra $500 for the SD card add on. I have been running higher EP around 180a and 150a EN on advanced square wave and was able to turn my balance up to 80-85% and still get a good cleaning action. The miller manual suggest running higher EN for more penetration but I have found if I do the opposite I can use less cleaning on the balance control and keep the heat out of my tungsten. I also run 120hz on the thinner materials (1/8") but stay at 80hz for just about everything else over that thickness. Now if I was doing a thick casting, then I may go lower turning it down to 50hz and use 25% helium 75% argon mix. The helium really helps and makes the 280 feel like a much bigger machine. It acts almost like a 350 on stright argon. Sometimes I even use the 25% helium mix on thinner stuff as well. I can cut the amps back by 30% and it still welds hot. Something about it really helps clean the puddle up and gives you a nice clean looking weld. I used to have a HTP 200 and you just about had to run mixed gas to do 1/4" material with it do to running out of amperage. It would do good with your 210 in the field if on a 120v extension cord and you could get a small 80cf bottle of 25%he to carry remotely.
The newer inverter machines have so many settings it is amazing what you can do with them. I also have a Lincoln tig 300/300 (375 amp) HF machine. There is no balance no frequency controls just basic 60 hz but you can really throw the heat on thicker materials. It dose a good job and is a tank at 800lbs. The more I play with the bells and whistles of the new dynasty's the more I like them though.

[Jared]

Originally Posted by flyingfrizzle

I takes a good hand to keep up with the pulser. On mishap and your trying to catch back up. Looks really good judging by the one pic. I like to use pulse on some things and have used it at .7pps going down outside corners like that. Really makes a consistent looking weld. I have got used to having a momentary switch on my ck 20 water cooled rig now and can pulse manually as needed with the button. Doing stuff where it is hard to keep up with a foot petal the micro switch really shines. My father dose anodized T-tops and tuna towers and I learned from him so I guess that's where I picked up on that as most of them guys manually pulse.
I can say one thing I really like that has helped me is the amplitude settings. The dynasty 210/280 has them like the 350/400 if you pay the extra $500 for the SD card add on. I have been running higher EP around 180a and 150a EN on advanced square wave and was able to turn my balance up to 80-85% and still get a good cleaning action. The miller manual suggest running higher EN for more penetration but I have found if I do the opposite I can use less cleaning on the balance control and keep the heat out of my tungsten. I also run 120hz on the thinner materials (1/8") but stay at 80hz for just about everything else over that thickness. Now if I was doing a thick casting, then I may go lower turning it down to 50hz and use 25% helium 75% argon mix. The helium really helps and makes the 280 feel like a much bigger machine. It acts almost like a 350 on stright argon. Sometimes I even use the 25% helium mix on thinner stuff as well. I can cut the amps back by 30% and it still welds hot. Something about it really helps clean the puddle up and gives you a nice clean looking weld. I used to have a HTP 200 and you just about had to run mixed gas to do 1/4" material with it do to running out of amperage. It would do good with your 210 in the field if on a 120v extension cord and you could get a small 80cf bottle of 25%he to carry remotely.
The newer inverter machines have so many settings it is amazing what you can do with them. I also have a Lincoln tig 300/300 (375 amp) HF machine. There is no balance no frequency controls just basic 60 hz but you can really throw the heat on thicker materials. It dose a good job and is a tank at 800lbs. The more I play with the bells and whistles of the new dynasty's the more I like them though.

Some good points, I don't have any 75/25 gas nor have I tried going up on the frequency but will experiment with both. I have been looking into getting a button recently, a T-top will be the next thing I am going to need and I don't like paying people to do what I feel like I can do on my own. I have no experience with anodized aluminum welding, but I think I can get the principles of it down if I run a handful of joints practicing the bump method before I start on the top. From what I read the button is a huge help, I have been using the pedal only so that will be a little learning curve in itself I think. These are fun projects to learn on, but having some welding experience I'm sure you can agree they are also the ones you will look back at in a year or two once you have something sorted out you will want to cut it off and do it again.

[flyingfrizzle]

Originally Posted by Jared

Some good points, I have no experience with anodized aluminum welding, but I think I can get the principles of it down if I run a handful of joints practicing the bump method before I start on the top.

That's how I started when I learned the anodized pipe welding. Cope out a bunch of pieces or use scraps and weld'em up. After a few you will get the hand of it. The fit up doesn't have to be perfect like a chromolly chassis or roll cage dose. Long as its close it welds up fairly good. I am not the best at it nor do I do it every day but a little practice and you will be able to do a top no problem. Biggest thing is there's no room for error. If you arc a section, your cutting it out and replacing it. There is no fixing it once you arc a piece and small mistakes can set you back big time.

[Ulf]

A lil late to this party, wondering what the dimensions are of the new console your going with.

I’m looking for a smaller console than the big one that came from the factory on my ‘74 SF

[Jared]

Originally Posted by Ulf

A lil late to this party, wondering what the dimensions are of the new console your going with.

I’m looking for a smaller console than the big one that came from the factory on my ‘74 SF

New console is 35.5” x 35.5”, but honestly I think I’m going to cut it down the middle and take 6” out of the width. It’s maybe 4” or so narrower than the original one and has no front seat area on it. I have plans for a t-top more than likely or at least rod storage on the starboard side of the console. If I leave it the width it is now I’ll end up with the same walkway space around the console the original one had, which I thought was not enough for my liking.

[Jared]

It’s in the water. Ended up doing the transom, cutting console in half and narrowing, and a ton of other stuff. Hung a new mercury 150 4 stroke on it, have 20 hours on it so far and like it a lot.

[Jared]

Have a little over 80 hours on the rebuild now, 900 miles on the odometer on my chart plotter. Myself and my better half have no kids for the week so we decided to put in here at Jupiter and take the ICW up to Hiram's in Sebastian for an overnight stay. 143 miles round trip, burnt 30.4 gallons. It took us around 5 hours of moving time each way plus a stop for lunch.

Still really happy with the Merc 150, it seems effortless getting up on plane and were cruising a nice 25 knots at around 5.5 gph. Better than average chance of getting a compliment or conversation starter from seacraft cult members at our lunch stops and marina stay. Every time I run the boat it is a rewarding experience, the hard work and long hours are getting replaced in my mind by good boat and fishing memories.