Welding helmet advice for a farmer

Shield Arc · Feb 21, 2013

No, we were talking about the high price the A/O Cool Blue welding lenses go for now a days.

Reyer Farms · Feb 21, 2013

Shield Arc said:
No, we were talking about the high price the A/O Cool Blue welding lenses go for now a days.

Well no wonder I was confused!!!! Y'all did it on purpose, didn't ya?

Shield Arc · Feb 21, 2013

Reyer Farms said:
Y'all did it on purpose, didn't ya?

Yeah, you caught us, it's a conspiracy!:laughing:

woodlandfarms · Mar 20, 2013

I am going to bump this up as I am having a helmet issue. Got the new toys, was using a HF helmet with my Lincoln ACDC Tombstone and it worked fine enough. Now with the Mig set I am really focusing on making good puddles. But maybe it is me, maybe I should just get over it. I got a Hobart helmet (I assume Hobart - no markings on it but looks a bit better than the HF and it probably came from Home Depot). Now when using it with the mig I am getting spots in my eyes. So I darken from a 9 to a 10 and I can't see the metal anymore. Maybe I need to add work lights? Like a 500 watt light stand? Just wondering how the pros deal with this. From all I have read I won't see the difference between a $50 and a $500 at my skill level.

Shield Arc · Mar 20, 2013

It will be a cold day in he!! when I spend $500.00 on a welding hood! I went way out of my comfort zone spending close to $100.00 for a auto lens. This seeing issue got to be one of the hardest things for us to help someone else with. If putting work lights on your project helps by all means do that. On the job site you'd get one of these

, but hey you got to be able to see, so you do what ever it takes.

k0ua · Mar 20, 2013

I use a 500 watt worklight on a stand pointed at the work.. I find it helps me.

James K0UA

Oliver1655 · Mar 20, 2013

My first auto darkening helmet had a larger viewing area & cost me $150. Someone liked it & walked off with it. I was NOT a happy camper! I replaced it with a HF that had to have AAA batteries. It worked well but the batteries would not always stay in place. HF upgraded the helmet to permanent rechargeable batteries. I have 3 of these. One I use all the time. One for visitors/helpers. The last is just a back-up. These are several years old & I haven't had any problems even when the temperature is below 0 degrees. I did not notice a big difference going from the larger view to the standard size. As others stated, the $30 ea I gave for these helmets was well invested.

Gary Fowler · Mar 20, 2013

woodlandfarms said:
I am going to bump this up as I am having a helmet issue. Got the new toys, was using a HF helmet with my Lincoln ACDC Tombstone and it worked fine enough. Now with the Mig set I am really focusing on making good puddles. But maybe it is me, maybe I should just get over it. I got a Hobart helmet (I assume Hobart - no markings on it but looks a bit better than the HF and it probably came from Home Depot). Now when using it with the mig I am getting spots in my eyes. So I darken from a 9 to a 10 and I can't see the metal anymore. Maybe I need to add work lights? Like a 500 watt light stand? Just wondering how the pros deal with this. From all I have read I won't see the difference between a $50 and a $500 at my skill level.

You should be able to see the MIG puddle with a shade 10 or even 13. Changing from a 9 to a 10 was the right thing to do but the helmet shouldn't have darkened that much. Try moving the knob back and forth while welding and see if you can see it changing gradually rather than abruptly.