What Welder have you got?

[fergusonforestry]

a clark 160 amp turbo mig and as a back up a lidl special arc £29.99 done well but could do with a fan, make sure what ever you get has one (usualy says turbo on it) save it tripping all the time

[Mesterh]

A cheap clarke 160 mig.

 

Cheap, cheerful but will melt 5mm which is good enough for me.

 

An expensive mig is a pleasure to use though.

 

My advice is to buy a mig, you know if you have a good weld or not, with a stick welder it might look good.

[Mike Hill]

Cheap 180 Amp Mig and a Huge Three Phase Stick welder that gets very little use.

[weldersunited]

We have Migatronic and Thermal Arc pulse/ synergic and standard Mig sets for our day to day workshop fabrication. All are three phase units and all synergic units are inverter based so have the ability to be used for ALU, Stick welding and scratch/ lift tig setups. For site work we run Mosa welder generator sets and for smaller site jobs we have Thermal Arc inverter welders.

 

It really does depend on what you want to do- If all your work is shed based then a decent MIG set will fit the bill perfectly, if it's repair work you have a job to beat good old fashioned stick welders (or inverter), simply due to the array of electrodes they will rub with the different materials you may encounter.

 

As others have said though, cleanliness and joint preparation are critical to a weld's success- as with most things time spent in preparation is rarely wasted- after all, you wouldn't put on a clean suit over a pair of dirty overalls would you!

[scraggs]

I have a murex tradesmig 240 which is pretty good for single phase, I picked it up s/h years ago from the people I used to do a bit of fitting/engineering work for so knew what it was like and jumped at the chance to buy it.

[Jim372xp]

I have a 1985 Petbow 400amp arc welder on 1485 hrs from new . It is mounted on a twin axle trailer and power is from a 3 cyl Perkins diesel engine that is fitted to the Massey Ferguson 35 tractors and is excellent for welding thick metal and for gouging (cutting metal with electrodes) also has 3 pin 240v plug so you can use angle grinders and drills from it. The only thing its noisy :thumbdown:but you can't have everything.

[fergusonforestry]

I have a 1985 Petbow 400amp arc welder on 1485 hrs from new . It is mounted on a twin axle trailer and power is from a 3 cyl Perkins diesel engine that is fitted to the Massey Ferguson 35 tractors and is excellent for welding thick metal and for gouging (cutting metal with electrodes) also has 3 pin 240v plug so you can use angle grinders and drills from it. The only thing its noisy :thumbdown:but you can't have everything.

 

thats not a welder thats a powerstation!

[Billy]

Picked up a SIP TOPMIG 195 today for £250 just got to get some rent free gas and I'm away!

 

 

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I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=51.373936,0.481146

[garth mc garth]

I have got the same welder and they aren't up to much when you have the amps cranked up. Wire feeds inconsistently so a neat weld is difficult, common problem as listed on the loads of welding forums is that the feed roller mount flexes and won't feed the wire

[robbo 110]

I have got the same welder and they aren't up to much when you have the amps cranked up. Wire feeds inconsistently so a neat weld is difficult, common problem as listed on the loads of welding forums is that the feed roller mount flexes and won't feed the wire

 

can you not brace the roller mounts?? make sure the liner through to the gun is clean, these also can wear causing feed problems, are you using 0.8 mm wire or 0.6 ?

 

0.6mm cannot be precision wound onto a reel, its very hit & miss

 

feed problems are common with most small migs, the grooves in the feed rollers mis-aligned/ wrong way round, bad quality euro torch connectors, worn tips & torches, keeping the torch in a straight as poss line from the welder, the list is endless, ive used one & had no problems