Welding a stainless steel toilet roll holder

Our Ikea toilet roll holder broke into two parts. On inspection there was just a single weld holding it together and that was obviously not very strong.

Broken toilet roll holder

As I have welding equipment I though it should be a straightforward repair. So I headed down to the workshopshed.

In the middle of last year I received a Strongarm portable welding table as part of my long service award. This is the first chance I’ve had to use it since.

Toilet roll holder clamped up for welding

I clamped up the work to a right angle offcut using some G-Clamps, ensuring that the joint was easily accessible. I used more offcuts to to ensure the work was not marked. The earth clamp I clipped directly onto one end.

RTech DC TIG welder

I used a #5 cup, 10L/min and 1.6mm tungsten. The welding went relatively well but I had the torch too far from the work as it got very hot with a large segment glowing orange. I did a full weld along the length of the joint and added some filler. This means that the junction was slightly proud but it was a quick job to file it flush.

Welded and filed stainless steel toilet roll holder

The overheating also meant that there was some colouration of the metal. That was cleaned off using a scotchpad.

Repaired toilet roll holder

The strongarm table worked well for this job. It was steady and there were plenty of options for how the work was setup. It was good to have a higher table than my workmate and there was no risk of burning either. My biggest gripe with the table is when it is folded up to put away, it likes to unfold when leant up against things. I’m sure I can work something out for it.

The toilet roll holder was the screwed back to the wall, job done.

Repaired toilet roll holder

4 thoughts on “Welding a stainless steel toilet roll holder

  1. horacio gurner says:

    Hey very interesting blog!

  2. Turrie says:

    Hello, it’s a pretty good post. I do agree your ideas you’ve present on this post. Toilet issues are always nasty but you have to do, also the repair fee is not cheap. Sometimes I prefer to do the job by myself. Do you still have any other articles about this title?

  3. […] the heat, I managed to get some welding done this weekend. The other Ikea stainless steel toilet roll holder failed a few weeks back and I’d promised to fix it following a trip to WeldAir in Dunstable […]

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