Pat Bennett Race Cars has been building custom drag racing cars for 23 years. In that time, the company has grown from a 1200-ft. shop to an almost 13,000 sq. ft. facility fully equipped with mills, lathes, cold saws, drill presses, tubing notches, tube benders, a complete metal forming cell with brakes, shears and rollers, and, of course, welding equipment.

The company builds all types of cars from class racers to pro-modified and pro-stock. Each car is built to the needs of the customer, which vary greatly depending on the speed, weight or tire size required for the type of racing the customer wants to do. Once the car is built, they will also accompany the customer to a test session to fine tune the chassis.

Welding plays a key role in creating a top-quality race car, according to Pat Bennett Race Car chassis builder Troy Spackman. A typical drag car chassis takes approximately 40 hours to weld. Great care is taken at Pat Bennett Race Cars to assure that every weld is top quality. Some of their pro-modified cars reach speeds of 230 mph, undergoing intense vibrations that can wreak havoc on poorly made welds. “Making structurally sound welds is part of what we do to make our cars as safe as possible, no matter how fast they go,” Spackman says. “We follow very strict welding procedures to ensure this level of safety.”

Spackman’s choice for filler metal is ESAB Spoolarc 83, an ER80S-D2 solid wire designed to provide high strength deposits in both as welded and stress relieved conditions. The Spoolarc 83 maintains precise control of the wire chemistry to provide good wetting and good rust/scale tolerance. Spoolarc 83 is the filler metal ESAB recommends for use on the 4130 chrome-moly material that Pat Bennett Race Cars uses on a chassis. This recommendation from a company that truly understands welding is very important to Spackman. “People in this business hear a lot of incomplete or inaccurate information from various sources or see in a magazine telling them what they should use. They don’t always think to talk to a manufacturer,” he says. When safety is an important issue, “it’s comforting knowing you’re using what you’re supposed to be using.” He also likes the wire’s welding characteristics. “I love the way it flows,” he notes. When he came to Pat Bennett Race Cars, Spackman talked every welder in the shop into converting to Spoolarc 83 for chrome-moly. The company now also uses other ESAB filler metals for other materials they weld, including Spoolarc 65 (ER70S-2) for mild steel and AlcoTec wires for aluminum structures.

Spackman is also a fan of ESAB equipment. At Pat Bennett Race Cars, everything is manually Tig welded. Every car is different, made to the specifications of the customer, so the builders rarely create two parts alike. Process control and weld quality are important considerations in their choice of Tig welders. Spackman recently arranged a sponsorship agreement with ESAB to equip Pat Bennett Race Cars’ tractor trailer with a Heliarc 161 Tig welder to use for on-site repairs at the race tracks. “We won’t have to compromise on repair quality at the races because now we have the right equipment,” Spackman says. The Heliarc 161 AC/DC power source is a light industrial power source with square wave AC output that yields superior welding with improved cleaning and no rectification.

ESAB also provided a PowerCut 650 plasma cutter for the shop. The workers in the Pat Bennett Race Car shop have significantly reduced cutting time by using this plasma cutter instead of a saw. “Nothing cuts as fast and clean and gives you as much control as the plasma cutter,” Spackman says. “You can cut pretty much any shape out of any material.” The employees at Pat Bennett were so happy with the plasma cutter that one employee purchased the smaller HandyPlasma 380 cutter for his home shop.

Spackman would also like to add a CaddyTig portable welder to the shop. At just 20 lbs., CaddyTig is small and easy to handle. It also has a pulse welding capability for precise control on out-of-position welds. “I’ve never used anything I like better,” he notes.

As Pat Bennett Race Cars continues its growth in the drag racing business, they know they have a partner they can rely on for quality welding equipment and filler metals.