Are you aware of the advantages of the mig welding process against others?

GMAW (MIG)
Welding Process

The GMAW process (Gas Metal Arc Welding), commonly known as MIG (Metal Inert Gas) and less commonly as MAG (Metal Active Gas), is an arc welding process which first appeared in the early forties, and became soon very popular because of its ability to join a wide range of materials (carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminium, magnesium) and thicknesses with all-position welding capabilities, high speed of work, low cost per length of weld metal deposited, low distortion and welding fume generation, minimum spatter and slag.

This process melts a metal with the high temperature generated by an electric arc, which is struck and then maintained between a continuously fed, consumable filler metal wire-electrode and the workpiece.

Power is provided by a direct current output (D.C.) with a static flat characteristic (usually a transformer which has its output rectified to direct current). The wire is fed to the arc through a welding torch, pushed by feed rollers mounted on a DC drive motor, and the current is passed to the wire through the copper contact tip in the torch nozzle. The wire melts in the arc and is transferred to the weld pool. A gas (or gas mixture) from an external supply is passed through the torch and exits through the shroud, shielding the arc and the molten metal thus protecting it from air contamination.

For each application, wire feed rate is proportioned to the arc power, and can be selected by the operator using a wire feed speed control: the device which will keep the speed at the selected value.
Because of this, it is normally referred as to a semiautomatic process: the operator manually holds the torch and move it along the workpiece, the control provides a constant wire feed rate.

In the last years, the big improvements in power sources technologies and high speed electronic controls have made this process even more friendly to the operator. The so-called “Synergic  welders”, thanks to their pre-set GMAW welding programs, can give simple one-knob control to the operator: for a selected material and thickness, all the welding parameters are automatically adjusted by the control.