Silencer Repair for Dummies

[Oppet]

Good tip to soften aluminium is to use oxy
1. use more acetylen in flame to paint the aluminium black
2. use more oxygen in flame to burn black colour away, carefully
3. you have soft aluminium.

[Ji Gantor]

Welcome Oppet,
That is a great addition to this thread.

Tight nuts

Ji

[Ji Gantor]

There are many different alloys of aluminium designed with different characteristics like the ability to be turned, welded or non corrosive.
Different elements are added to the alloy to increase strength as well.
The other thing that increases strength in some aluminium alloys is heat tempering.
If you have ever purchased ali you may have noticed that it has a series like 6061 and at the end there may be T6.
The 6061 tells what elements are in the alloy while the T6 describes the temper.
To reduce the strength of a T6 ali alloy all you have to do is anneal it with heat.
This will make it much more easier to work with a hammer.


Tight nuts

Ji

[pancho]

Hey oppet going back in history again [as us old farts tend to] I had a A\Healey 100 which had lots of aluminium sheet in the bodywork. I needed to repair a crack around the radiator air inlet and one of my mechanic mates said its easy[usually means they have never tried themself] to weld  sheet aluminium you just cover it with sooty flame with the oxygen turned off and then start welding with a neutral flame. If the sooty part gets to far from the tip look out! SO after blowing several holes I gave up and bought some eutectic filler rod.cheers wally.

[Ji Gantor]

TIG welded.
Inside welding very difficult to get the torch in there.

Tight nuts

Ji

[Ji Gantor]

External TIG welding is much easier.


Tight nuts

Ji

[Ji Gantor]

Test fit.
Looks and works great.

Tight nuts

Ji

[Lozza]

Geez your ali welding has come on leaps and bounds there Ji, especialy the inside weld. I would be very happy with that appearence.

[pancho]

Me to.

[Ji Gantor]

You guys are too kind.
I just keep practising.
Tube welding is the hardest, you have to keep stopping so you can turn the job around.

Tight nuts

Ji

[Ji Gantor]

I was not going to polish this end cap but it looks so good I think I will.
I still have to pack the silencer and tap threads into the new ali end cap but all the hard work is now done.

Tight nuts

Ji

[mx250]

Test fit.
Looks and works great.

Tight nuts

Ji

When are you going into production?

[Ji Gantor]

Hi Graeme,
No mate I am happy doing my own work.
That way it is still fun.
I would like to know what GMC thinks, may be he can start making them for sale.

Tight nuts

Ji

[Lozza]

You guys are too kind.
I just keep practising.
Tube welding is the hardest, you have to keep stopping so you can turn the job around.

Tight nuts

Ji

I'll show you a little trick one day

[oldmxracer]

Nice job.