One tool you'll need to keep handy is a pair of needle-nosed pliers. Especially while getting settings adjusted, your wire will often shoot "whiskers" (3-6 inch pieces of wire) that short off at your base metal and tip at the same time as you try to start an arc. Sometimes these will stick or plug your tip where the wire comes out. THAT is what you need the pliers for. Also, even with the use of splatter spray you will get splatter build-up inside the cone and around your tip. It is advisable to check the inside every once in a while and scrape out the accumulated splatter- another use for the needle-nosed pliers.

A second tool I found VERY useful is a 10 or 12 inch bastard mill file. Grind the end into a chisel shape. It makes a great tool to scrape and knock splatter off after you have finished welding and will save a ton of time vs grinding.

Just skimmed through the thread, that wire wheel can be dangerous. I use Dewalt braided cup brushes (these)and wires still fly of...at 1000s of RPMs That style you have in your pic will be throwing wires like it's opening day

A face shield and leather apron are really necessary with grinders

Time to pick up some square tubing, angle iron, some expanded steel for shelves and a piece of 1/4" or more thick plate for the top
They have since moved but I used to have a scrap yard in town. I would show up with a bottle of J.D. and get to pick as much as I wanted out of the yard, just saying

No, wire is easier. But you will know that soon enough 

Sounds like you're tip is too far away or the wire speed is too fast or more heat or your moving to slow or fast Give it a couple seconds to get the puddle going then make small circles moving forward, don't be in a big hurry. There is a feel but some practice on scrap will help develop it.  Under the side panel should have a basic guide line for the thickness of the metal. Don't be afraid to get your face right in there, scabs on the top of the coconut are a right of passage

My face shield was $15 or so. I use a face shield and safety glasses. It is nice when it gets hot out compared to a hood. I use a cheap, I think it was $18, Hobart leather apron from Tractor supply. I will say that one if not more fire extinguishers should be handy as in pulled out and place next to where you are working. Welding and grinding will send sparks a long fucking way. As the saying goes;

You using flux core or gas? Argon mix or CO2?
Also you can spray an area with anti-spatter before welding to keep the extra work down.

Kind of a personal question.................................. how big/what size are you? I might have a light "welding" jacket I can send you. It's actually a outer layer of kevlar firefighter jacket, but it works as a welding jacket nicely.

Nope, you absolutely will love having a welding jacket. IM me a shipping address and I'll get it out this week. It is long sleeve, a neck protector, pockets, zipper and velcro sealed. Protects, keeps you clean, no welding sun burns, After an auto darkening helmet, it's the best thing I've done for accessories for welding.

For cleaning steel up I use flapper disks, you can also shape metal with them. But they work great for removing spatter and cleaning metal before welding.   flapper disks

Relax, I got it for free. My son used it for a little while and now he has my shoulders, so it no longer fits him.

Trust me, knowing your clothes won't catch on fire or random burns happening WILL help your welding.

It'll fit you loosely, but it will mitigate welding dangers and help your confidence. Not to mention, keep you a bunch cleaner.

For settings on that welder, have the voltage switch on 2 unless you are doing auto body.

Important: make sure the set screw on the knob is tight. Mine wasn't when new, and I almost brought the thing back because I could not get it to adjust for crap. Once I tightened that set screw, it was fine 

On this machine, I turn the feed down for thicker metal. You want to heat the metal as much as possible, just to the line before burning through. Know if you turn it down too much, the wire will "burn up" into the nozzle before it gets the job done, UN which case increase the feed just a bit, as in 1/3rd way to the next number on the gauge. 

While I do 1/4" thick, I would not exceed 3/16" until you get good and learn the machine. You can easily weld 1/8" all day with ease.

You need your helmet bright enough to see the weld pool. You are looking for that pool to "take" on both pieces of metal. You almost always have to wander a bit from one piece to the other, I like to make rows if "C" s. It's like soldering actually. If the weld pool doesn't take, it bubbles, which you can see as you weld. This happens more on thick metal, or if your feed us too fast. Remember, welding us merely melting your pieces of steel, and while molten, adding fill material, which you also have to melt. If you don't melt one piece, the weld us just sitting on top, not becoming a piece of the steel. A welder just combines melting your pieces and adding filler.

Keep playing with the feed setting, get your nozzle to about 1/2" or a bit less to your work, and keep the voltage on #2 unless your doing auto body type thickness. You can also crank the feed and weld fast on thin stuff while in voltage #2 

Bake that dude some brownies and ask if you can look over his shoulder next time he welds something up. Bring your helmet and some good shoes. That will give you some idea on distance and technique, and just flat out make you more comfortable with the whole process. I figure it's the same with my bees. I've never messed with bees before, and even though I'm suited up in full gear, watched all the videos, read the book, asked questions on the forum, I'm still apprehensive about screwing up. I should have gone to my cousin's house and worked his bees with him just to get a better feel for it.

So you're near Bowling Green, there ought to be some guys who can weld there. We loved the Corvette museum.

One thing that I heard a lot as I went down this same path a few months ago was to buy some quality wire (Lincoln, etc.).  I don't know what TSC sells so not saying it's either good or bad, but maybe still worth being aware of.  Apparently the stuff that HF sells is pretty worthless... but then again, that's not from direct experience, just the buzz.

Honestly, don't worry about the wire. I'm sure its fine. My favorite sticks for the welder are WW2 (or so were are told) era gov't surplus sticks that have been in cardboard boxes in a warehouse since the end of the war that my Grandfather picked up a pallet of at auction some years ago. Are they top quality? No, but they lay a nice bead if I do my part.

As far as settings, other than the switch on 2, scrap whatever you learned on the dial yesterday since the screw was loose. Start over. Start from a high, and turn down until the wire isn't pushing into the steel anymore, but melting as fast as you are using it.

That one is fine.

When there is so much crud built up that you cannot get wire through, or its eaten away pretty bad is when you change the tip. You can clean tips (they make small files to fit on the inside where the wire is) for a while if you want, but they are cheap enough I just replace when I have issues, which is 1-2 tips/year.

The tip is toast when the wire cannot be made to pass through it. Usually that happens when the wire melts up into the tip and plugs the hole. Even then the tip is probably OK if you can clear the opening. Tip cleaners (same ones as torch tip cleaners) might clear the obstruction.

If your tip does clog, the first step I'd make is to pull the cone back to expose the tip and rub the tip hard across a rough piece of metal or a file. This will often break the blob free. Cut it off and go back to welding.

If that doesn't work, unscrew the tip (might be hard to do because you'll be twisting the wire) and run out about 6 inches of wire. Cut it off long and twist/hammer/whatever to break the wire free inside the tip. Failing that, put on a new tip.

Did anybody ever mention to make sure you are using a 20 amp breaker circuit? If not, I did now. 

You can get away with a 15 amp circuit if you don't have anything else on that circuit at the time you are welding, and weld in smaller runs. As in don't expect to weld constantly for 5 minutes, just a minute and give the breaker a chance to cool. I did that for years 

I'm having a hard time comprehending where you are actually having trouble. It could be your equipment setup. It could be your weld area preparation. It could be your technique. It is probably a combination of all of them.

If you have cleaned your weld area down to clean bare metal, I'd consider that OK.

Next, review your equipment setup. Is your mig gun assembled correctly? On the rigs I used, the outer cone extends past the tip (maybe 3/4 inch) and encloses it so that the gas protects the molten metal. Even with flux-cored wires, the molten puddle needs to be shielded from ambient air. Do you have a breeze blowing across your weld? If so, you might have to set up some kind of wind screen. Also, double check that you are getting a GOOD ground. Best if it is near the weld area (1-2 ft) and grounded to clean bare metal. If your ground spot is rusty, remove the ground clamp and hit a lick with your grinder, then replace the clamp. Sometimes you even need to clean off your ground clamp. Even if it is brand new metal, grind the ground area to knock off any mill scale. YOU WILL NOT GET A GOOD WELD IF YOU DON"T HAVE A GOOD GROUND.

Finally, and least important for learning, is technique. Don't worry about making little "c"s or waves by working your gun, it will weld just fine by pushing your gun in a straight line. Once you get comfortable with starting, you'll find that you'll naturally weave a nice bead. With about 1/2 inch of wire sticking out, put your gun maybe an inch above your starting point for the weld, cover your eyes and pull the trigger. As you pull the trigger push the tip down towards but not quite touching the weld area. I'm guessing the tip will be about 1/2 an inch from the weld, maybe 3/8 of an inch but probably not closer. As your weld begins, adjust the distance in order to keep the bead flowing. You'll be able to tell if you are too far away or too close.

Did you notice I said PUSH your bead? This is different than most stick welding, where you pull or draw the bead along. With a wire feed welder, you usually will angle the gun/tip about 45 degrees back from the direction of weld.

eta: I forgot to mention wire selection. If you continue to have trouble, post the specs on your wire. Like rod selection when stick welding, it can be important to match wire to your metal.

Also, I suggest you practice running a flat bead on some thicker metal (1/4-3/8 in) before attempting to complicate matters by sticking pieces together. It'll be a breeze once you get your starting touch down!

@DK-Prof

I used to have a 100ft 10ga cord I bought at Walmart, but everyone's gone bonkers on the price of those. Basically $1 foot. I would run that with a short 12ga cord on the end of it when I was welding up the fence at my first house. It worked great. I left it at work under my desk and the next time I went looking for it, it was gone. My Dad grabbed and used it to power one of our out buildings we were expanding into. 7 years later, it's still hanging up there, now directly wired into a 20amp GFI socket. It's not like we don't have rolls of 12ga wire and conduit laying around here.

I have a 3500 watt/4000 surge generator, it's kind of iffy to run the welder, it doesn't do well on the highest setting. But if you need something welded out in the field, it works in a pinch.

Hey Kitty, your jacket is waiting at the post for you.

How about pics of those welds

This could be your issue. Most structural steel (Most? I really mean all STRUCTURAL) is hotrolled. What color is your metal? Black or silver? if anything other than bright shiny silver, it is almost guaranteed it is hot rolled and has mill scale on it. That mill scale is oxide, just like rust, but is a different type of iron oxide. It is not conductive, you need to grind it off. Try grinding on a piece and I bet you see a difference. If so, you'll need to grind it around your weld, otherwise it is just like welding on rust. I don't know much about welding, but I know a thing or two about steel (7 years in the industry, 1-2 of which was at a bar mill making angles, rounds, channel, and rebar).

Cold finished or cold rolled steel would be the exception, they would be shiny (or rusty) and it'd only be sheets, plates, or rounds. There are very few flats, channels, or angles that are cold finished out there (IE, none I have ever seen unless the flat was cut from sheet).

Dull grey would also be a rarity, but could be a hot rolled P&O (pickled and oiled), but that is not commonly available except in sheet metal.

I didn't realize you were working with sheet / plate. Looking at that it could very well be pickled and oiled sheet steel (which would have a matte appearance). It COULD be plain hot rolled black plate, I've not seen enough of that to know for certain, but I don't think it is. If its pickled you should be getting a good ground (though it never hurts to grind a spot for a good ground as I've found with my plasma cutter). Looking at this picture ( http://businesskorea.co.kr/sites/default/files/field/image/hot%20rolled%20steel%20plates.jpg ) I am thinking yours is hot rolled. I always saw it full width so the blue edges were visible, but the center is grey since it can't oxidize as much when it gets coiled up. For structural items the scale is a lot thicker and easier to see.

I am not certain how to tell easily between HR and HRPO just by looking, you may not be able to easily. Don't feel bad, people who have been working with steel for 10 or 20 years THINK they know but most don't (seeing what is put out there on the forums makes your head spin with whats stated wrong). For farm work you won't really need to know much about it. I can sum it up for you:

Grade:
A36 - most common for shapes / structurals, plain jane steel, 36,000 yield strength (there are lots of others too but this is 90%+ of the market)
CS-b / commercial steel / commercial quality - this is the common grade of sheet steel. For HR material it is around 35,000 psi yield strength, for cold rolled around 25,000

Rounds:
Hot rolled - thick layer of scale
Cold finished - nice shiny smooth surface, hard due to extra cold work

Structurals (angles, channels, etc)
Hot rolled only, RARELY pickled

Sheet:
Hotrolled (HR) - scale layer, can be thick like the blue edges in the above pic, or light gray
HRPO (HR pickeld and oiled) - dipped in acid to remove the scale then oiled for rust prevention
Cold Rolled - shiny surface, also typically oiled. Slightly weaker than hot rolled because it comes annealed (this is a common mis-conception that it is stronger, it is not)

That is probably as much to it as there needs to be for 80-90% of what anybody might do.