2018 YZ450 welds?

I like it, reminded me a little of the original Ali Honda frames at first look.

kopfjaeger wrote:

Is it just me or just the bike in MXA's video? The frame welds on that thing look horrible. Cant believe they would send it out. Always liked Yamaha, but dang

I bet the x-rays they took to verify weld penetration look like total #weldporn

Damn robots

Looks like the welds were repaired due to some kind of defect via the automated process.

I noticed the same thing, ugly for sure. I don't think it was repaired manually though, as the welds on Vital's test bike were identical.

Sheriff245 wrote:

I noticed the same thing, ugly for sure. I don't think it was repaired manually though, as the welds on Vital's test bike were identical.

Well if they had a part fit up issue that was the same on a few hundred of the first parts i could see the repairs looking similar, you can see where they TIG welded a area where there may have been a low spot or undercut.

Looks like a 10 year old welded the frame spars together.

Here is a pic of the display bike at muddy creek I took.

Lets hope they perform better then they look.

Damn, really? Has to be a reason for it, that looks pretty bad.

Looks horrible, i work, weld on cars for a living & no one is paying me for those hoge looking blobs of shit that yamaha welded.

Wasn't there a production delay of some sort? Could it be that these welds are a "do over"?

Frodad78 wrote:

Damn, really? Has to be a reason for it, that looks pretty bad.

I agree Fro. I usually don't nitpick things on bikes , but dang those weld "look " terrible. Maybe they are making some corrections due to the frame cracking in certain areas over the past couple years? I would rather have an ugly weld that doesn't break , then a pretty one that does though. Hope that's what they were going for.

You guys are right, they totally would send marketing bikes out for photos that have random shitty unnecessary welds on them.

Judging a weld by it's appearance alone is ridiculously dumb. Get yourselves together, people. Those welds are perfectly fine.

They look to me like robotic MIG welds, not tig, which is why the weld bead doesn't look all dimey and #weldporn worthy. Yes, you can mig weld aluminum and robotic mig welding is very common for fixtured aluminum welding.

And those are not root pass welds, meaning there is another weld below those that ensures full penetration. Those are filler pass welds that are on top of the root pass weld and, yeah, they don't look pretty. So what? The xray test is all that matters. Yamaha would never release an inferior frame with compromised welds. That is a massively, massive liability. They have very strict quality assurance on that stuff.

Swann wrote:

Judging a weld by it's appearance alone is ridiculously dumb. Get yourselves together, people. Those welds are perfectly fine.

They look to me like robotic MIG welds, not tig, which is why the weld bead doesn't look all dimey and #weldporn worthy. Yes, you can mig weld aluminum and robotic mig welding is very common for fixtured aluminum welding.

And those are not root pass welds, meaning there is another weld below those that ensures full penetration. Those are filler pass welds that are on top of the root pass weld and, yeah, they don't look pretty. So what? The xray test is all that matters. Yamaha would never release an inferior frame with compromised welds. That is a massively, massive liability. They have very strict quality assurance on that stuff.

ummmmmmmm

Swann wrote:

Judging a weld by it's appearance alone is ridiculously dumb. Get yourselves together, people. Those welds are perfectly fine.

They look to me like robotic MIG welds, not tig, which is why the weld bead doesn't look all dimey and #weldporn worthy. Yes, you can mig weld aluminum and robotic mig welding is very common for fixtured aluminum welding.

And those are not root pass welds, meaning there is another weld below those that ensures full penetration. Those are filler pass welds that are on top of the root pass weld and, yeah, they don't look pretty. So what? The xray test is all that matters. Yamaha would never release an inferior frame with compromised welds. That is a massively, massive liability. They have very strict quality assurance on that stuff.

"Yamaha would never release an inferior frame with compromised welds."

Haven't they been doing that for the last few years?

I highly doubt they would be doing a root pass on those frames. More then likely the areas where there are a 2nd pass is probably because there was a gap or poor part fit. I am sure they cross section them but who knows what their QC process is there. Strength isnt in the welds on these frames, the casting slides into the extrusion and holds a bulk of the load.

Swann wrote:

Judging a weld by it's appearance alone is ridiculously dumb. Get yourselves together, people. Those welds are perfectly fine.

They look to me like robotic MIG welds, not tig, which is why the weld bead doesn't look all dimey and #weldporn worthy. Yes, you can mig weld aluminum and robotic mig welding is very common for fixtured aluminum welding.

And those are not root pass welds, meaning there is another weld below those that ensures full penetration. Those are filler pass welds that are on top of the root pass weld and, yeah, they don't look pretty. So what? The xray test is all that matters. Yamaha would never release an inferior frame with compromised welds. That is a massively, massive liability. They have very strict quality assurance on that stuff.

Bro.
You do realize judging welds on appearance is pretty fucking normal.
We know it's MIG, that's ain't the problem.
You sure Yamaha is xraying every single frame? You mustve missed the numerous cracked frame threads. It happens to every brand, but Yamaha seems to have a knack for shitty welds.

colintrax wrote:

Bro.
You do realize judging welds on appearance is pretty fucking normal.
We know it's MIG, that's ain't the problem.
You sure Yamaha is xraying every single frame? You mustve missed the numerous cracked frame threads. It happens to every brand, but Yamaha seems to have a knack for shitty welds.

I know it's pretty fucking normal to judge a weld by its appearance but that still doesn't change the fact that judging a weld by its appearance alone isn't a good idea. I can lay a beautiful, perfect, consistent bead and have zero penetration. How are you going to determine the quality of that weld based on a grainy picture posted on the internet?

I didn't know Yamaha is known for shitty welds. Present-day aluminum frames of their steel frames? Yes, I would expect every frame to be xrayed. The fact those welds look like keloid scars doesn't mean they are shitty welds.

I should know better than to wander into a conversation about weld quality on the interwebs.

Maybe they glooped em up good this time so they wont keep cracking amirite??

Well, they don't look all that pretty but looks to me like they aren't bad welds. Probably nothing wrong with the function. I don't think yamaha x-rays every frame that gets welded. A robot doesn't make mistakes. If it's programmed right there's no need to check every frame.

theycallmeebryan wrote:

Looks like a 10 year old welded the frame spars together.

Ouch.. What's up with these janky welds?

I'd seen this photo maybe 20 times today, hadn't noticed it up until this thread. Can someone please tell me how this panned out?

My point is, sound or not, theyre ugly as hell. For 10k i would expect the industry standard.

I'd think you'd want the build up in a high wear area like that. From what I've seen most of the issues on these frames have been in the stem down tube area anyways.

Why is there a weld there anyway? Why wouldn't they just cast the whole frame?

Don't let me interrupt the online weld engineers but FYI, the bigger the blob of weld doesn't mean stronger.

I'm not seeing the problem with the welds? They look like they're pretty standard compared to other Al framed bikes?