Outer Limits 4x4 Board

has anyone welded a stock rover axleshaft of any kind. i.e it broke and you welded back together, not a welded diff. what would the material be classed as, high carbon, low alloy? what prep work would you do for MIG
cheers, serg

Someone asked a similar question recently and Bill (daddylonglegs) gave a positive response.

I would search for that thread. May have been over in general tech forum.

First up I have to admit that I know 75% of bugger all about welding.
I have successfully welded half a toyota shaft to half a landrover shaft by boring out a hollow bar, drilling holes through the side, pressing shafts in and pool welding through the holes with stainless arc rods.
The different types of heat treatment of various axles seem to respond differently to welding or other types of interference, for example I once machined the stubshaft of an induction hardened aftermarket 110 CV joint.
I removed a small amount of metal from where the inner spindle seal rubs to clear a RangeRover spindle which does not have the inner seal. The first time any real torque was applied to this shaft it snapped very clean where I had machined it, at the transition point of hard untouched surface to the slightly softer machined surface. The diameter of the broken section was larger than the spline area.

An engineer of sorts once told me than the heat from welding can'' refine''
fatigued metal, so the success that some people have claimed in other threads (mainly on Pirate)rewelding a fatigued and broken axle shaft may
have some factual basis.
Bill.

The problem with welding any hardenable alloy is that through the heat affected zone of the weld, there is the full range of fully annealed to the highest temper. The proper thing to do with any hardenable alloy is to heat treat after welding (post weld heat treat) to give the desired phse strcuture evenly through the part.

Any alloys that have high hardenability, such as 0.4% carbon steels and higher normally require preheat to prevent crack and excessive hardness developing around the weld.

And yes, welding will anneal the area around the weld. This does remove any fatique history assuming cracking does not already exist. It would be better and much easier to simply heat treat the whole piece. Heat treating is a pretty simple thing to do and does not require any fancy equipment.

red90 wrote:Heat treating is a pretty simple thing to do and does not require any fancy equipment.

I reckon buying a new axle is easier.