Hi All, This tool is part of some stuff I inherited . I don't know what it is. I looks like it might connect to a car battery. It has 6 gauge wire, and the rod looks like copper cased carbon. I might have had a second rod on the other clamp. Any ideas what it would be used for. Here are pictures.
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With Half My Brain Tied Behind My Back
Still More Clever Than Mr.Prissy Pants
My guess is it is clamped onto a pipe (copper?) to electrically heat the pipe section between the clamps, probably with an arc welding set or similar supplying the current.
Why do you want to heat the pipe? Maybe it is two pipes and a sleeve or they have been formed to overlap or you are adding a tee and you are heating it to solder or braze the joint.
In some locations it would produce a lot less collateral damage than using a flame.
It's used to find short circuits on high voltage lines. They are always in good shape, because after one or two uses, they usually get passed along to relatives. ;-)
Carbon torch for use with a welder. You clamp the cable ends in the electrode holder and the ground (your choice which goes where) The rods get adjusted to angles The closer to straight across they are the shorter the "flame" angle them more and the "flame" will extend out.
You can use it just like you would any other torch.
To strike the ark and adjust the "flame" you slide one carbon in/out (usually the smaller tip section)
The one I have came with an oddball Wards welder. It actually works pretty well once you know how it operates.
Thanks Steve, I did a search of carbon arc torch and found several similar units. Yes, the handle has a slider to move the position of one rod. What is it about carbon that causes it to get hot at the point of contact. I used a couple of carbon rods and a car battery to heat a coupler with at stuck set screw. The heat is generated right at the contact point. It makes it seem like you can't make a good connection to carbon. Mike
Car battery doesn't provide the correct current. That unit gets used on an AC welder. The AC switching breaks and reforms the arc.
If you connect it up, set the welder at about 150 amps, set a pair of the carbons at a V and bring them together it will strike an arc. Then you open the V to create a larger arc. As you use the torch the arc will consume the electrodes and you have to keep sliding the rods closer to compensate.
The big problem is that you still need to use a welding helmet while using it AND the RF they throw off while in use makes a nice BUZZ on the radio....
They can do a lot of the jobs an OXY/fuel torch can do BUT heat control is harder.
Nope; I had one and the carbon arc torch is used for brazing, NOT CUTTING! Hooked it to my electric arc transformer at about 50 Amp setting. The torch plasma flame melts brazing rods to braze metals together,
The electrodes are available at most welding shops. If you have an AC output welder they are not a bad item to have. You can braze, silver solder, and heat items with it without lighting a torch.
The carbon burns in the process - forming CO2 and white hot arc. The carbon is a semi-conductor - just about like the IC's and transistors. It is used as a resistor for low power applications.
The copper conducts the high current and then the tip is all carbon - as it burns back, the copper is burnt off (ring at a time).
A lot of energy is given off in the process - making CO2 gas and a lot of heat and light.
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