Help! Learning to weld

[sixdogs]

For starters, I like this idea the best.

 

[uglyboywith11fingers]

I originally tried doing this, I hooked each probe one to each hot and plugged the cord in as far as I could, I only read 60V across them, the switch was on if I remember. I just assumed this was because they prongs were not making a good enough connection, could this be an issue?

reading 60V when you expect 240V is real strange. If a poor connection is causing that kind of voltage drop, it would be smoking a bit.
Something not quite right here... yeah that's an understatement...:cool2:

Pete

 

[zeeracer]

I would change out the outlet just for grins

 

[Industrial Toys]

I have trouble shooted (shot?) thousands of circuits. It is not uncommon for the simplest of things to be our undoing! Sometimes the relationship of one part is not fully understood to the next part. Why do batteries, starters and alternators seem, all to often fail in some sort of conspired fashion?

Why do my test leads fail while in the middle of such chaos? Or my (Stupid) Fluke meter times out and the display goes blank (to save the 9 volt battery life)!

The sad thing is, all too often when you get things going (as you will) you never in the end really know what the true, initial cause was! And that means, the educational value of the painfull experience is highly deminished!

 

[dragoneggs]

Have we established whether the on/off switch is good yet?

 

[newbury]

Have we established whether the on/off switch is good yet?

Per the OP the welding shop said it ran fine. That's why I suggested he take it back there and have them show him how to run it.

 

[Walkin Horse]

I am wondering if everything is wired right and the shops says it works sooo. Without meaning anything smart. Is it possible that you are putting the rod in the holder backwards. Meaning that your trying to strike the arc with the bare end. If not start with the holder and touch the ground. Arc or no arc. Start from there and work back to the machine.

I have myself and seen other guys do it. Stick the rod in the holder and clamp it on the flux. No amount of beating on the workpiece will get an arc.

 

[ThomasH]

well I see both hot wires from the outlet connecting to a single incoming wire. In other words there's two outlets connected on with one incoming wire so is three wires under one wire nut. There's no way in the world you can have 240 that way I'm not sure how you're reading it. is this connected to a 2 pole or doublr breaker or a single breaker. maybe there's something in that picture I'm not seen

it is clearly NOT wired that way. The lead that is tied together is the ground, which is tied to the box, so there is a wire nut there. The two hot leads come straight in from the conduit to the outlet as they should.

 

[dsparks1024]

Okay so I tested the welder a my friends house, and it works fine... So the issue is with the power in my garage. How can I tell if the outlet is single phase? I wondering if that is the issue because the welder says input: single phase.

I will try the light bulb suggestion when I get home to see if it can handle a load. Other than that I may have to can an electrician.

Thanks for all of your suggestions!

 

[uglyboywith11fingers]

so, in post #16 you say you measured 245V between the 2 hot wires on the outlet, when you had the box open.
in post # 36 you measured only 60V between the 2 hot terminals of the welder plug when plugged into the outlet.

sounds like that narrows it down to the outlet/receptacle itself ??? Like I said earlier, if there is a bad connection somewhere that is causing that much of a voltage drop when the welder is plugged in/turned on, I would expect to see some smoke and or overheating of said bad connection.

can you confirm that the reading of 60V is only when the welder is turned on, and it should read 240V when the welder is turned off.

Pete