Firepit

I bought a fire pit off of 42 fab and it was a lot of fun to put together and use.

I bought a fire pit off of 42 fab (https://www.42fab.com/weld-it-yourself/firebowl?category=Firepits) and it was a lot of fun to put together and use. Welding everything up and getting it all fitted was a bit of a struggle but I learned a lot. Besides getting your settings up and right, you also have to be sitting pretty comfortable.

More importantly, you have to make sure the welds are penetrating. I used my little YesWelder to do this project and it did alright. I wanted to try stick welding but I just couldn’t figure it all out. Scraped it a ton and got it to arc but I was running a 6013 instead of a 6010 and the rod was being eaten up. I learned after, that the different rods had different uses. Which meant I would end up eating through a lot more rods.

I did end up getting a 6011 (similar to 6010) but I had messed something up with the stinger and caused it to arc at the actual stinger. So I chose to switch to flux core welding. Which turned out a lot better. I had a friend giving me pointers and helping along the way. With his help, I was able to lay down some pretty solid welds. Though at the beginning, they were pretty shaky and bad. As I got comfortable and more into a rhythm I was able to get this done pretty quick.

After a little bit of messing around, I was able to put this together and get a solid fire going. Though after 30 minutes or so the ash pile was right around the top of the bowl. So for version two, I’m going to make the same thing just scaled up.

As the wind flew over the top the gaps pushed more air into the pit. Besides, when burning some leaves or somewhat wet wood the fire was smokeless. And getting some temperature readings the bottom of the pit stayed around 150 degrees Fahrenheit compared to the 600+ degree fire itself. This could be from the splits in the feet at the bottom or maybe the steel not transferring the heat as much. I’m not sure.

All in all, it was a lot of fun! And for $50 it was an easy afternoon of fun. I just started welding this summer. So this dry sponge is just trying to learn everything and anything.