Re: I \"need\" a welder..?
Talking about welders is probably a subject that should be avoided like politics and religion. But . . .
Last summer we moved about five miles. Suddenly, I had no neighbors with welders -- at least none who would admit to owning one.
I hadn't owned a welder in over 30 years. I looked long and hard at what to get. Oxy-acetylene? Lincoln 225 stick? MIG/Flux Core?
I wanted something I could easily move without a forklift or a hernia. Something I could take to the work, not vice versa. I looked around at most of what had been welded and fabricated in the past couple of years. 99% was 1/4-inch or less. On some heavier pieces, things were brazed or just tack welded anyway.
It came down to MIG or Oxy.
I settled on a little 115 VAC Lincoln 135. It includes the gas option, but so far I've just used the flux core.
Great machine, and I've fixed and fabricated everything I've needed so far. First day I had it, I had to fabricate a new eyebolt for a 3-point hitch sway chain that I destroyed. Besides the custom eye bolt I fabricated (a 3/4-inch nut welded to the head of a 3/4-inch bolt), I had to reweld the piece of 3/8-inch chain that went through the eye of the fabricated bolt. I sold that tractor last week, but I sure did a lot of work with it since that repair and a number of other modifications/repairs.
Just last night, I used a rusty and cruddy old lawnmower blade and a couple of 2-inch pieces of rusty 1/2-inch rebar to make a drawbar lock. Except for the cuts with my chop saw, nothing else was cleaned or prepped on any of the pieces. I used a grinder to round some of the welded edges, and the penetration was good. No prep, and maybe two minutes of welding ?? The flux core is real forgiving of rust and paint. It just leaves a little spatter - but no worse than a stick.
The little welder even runs well off my portable generator.
If I can't do it with this little welder, then I probably should have somebody else do it who really knows how to weld.