I've got to go the exhaust by March, so I'm going to get a new cat and new muffler. If the muffler and cat are stainless, do I need to set my welder up to weld stainless? What about aluminized tubing? And anything else I need to worry about?

You can weld stainless using mild steel - but then you would be losing the advantage of using stainless in your exhuast (no rust) if you have a small wire welder you're in luck since you can buy a 1lb. spool of stainless wire (go small like .023) for about $20 dollars yes its alitte expensive. You can also use c25 ARG/CO2 mix but you will only want to do one single pass -no overpassing welds- you could spring for a special tri mix gas , and not have to worry about overlapping welds but its exhaust you should be able to get it in one pass. There is one problem however -using mig process & C25 with stainless makes for VERY poor "out of position control" the wire likes to ball up & fall especially around your neck , and down your sleeves :eek: :D . If you can tack it on the truck then take it off , and weld it in position.
As far as the aluminized just lightly prep Preferably with 3m roloc disc or sand disc, try not to make take it off much further than you have to ( otherwise youll lose the corrosion resistance)
This should pretty much do it.
weldpro

If I MIG welded with .030 to aluminized tube, do the welds need to be coated with something? ....or am I good to go?

Holy brought back from obscurity Batman:eek:

Originally posted by Bubba Ray Boudreaux
Holy brought back from obscurity Batman:eek:

Dammit!

Search noob!

....okay, so I search and now this! Are you people ever satisfied? :flipoff2:

Oh, and whadabout my question? :D

I don't even prep the surface on aluminized pipe and never had a problem unless it was fence post. just hit it with sand paper and weld, yes .30 mig is fine. don't need to coat.

I wouldn't worry about the welds, Exhaust shops never do..

I guess an update is in order.

I had the shop do the complete job for $300. That was new cat and muffler and tube from the Y-pipe to the rear.

They didn't coat any of the welds, but I haven't had the truck in anything too nasty since, but they will require some lov'in before I make another trip back home in the winter.