MIG Welder for Beginner/Light Use

[YanmarFever]

I'm glad we got our information right finally. Unlike the last thread about wire!

OP: Cant go wrong with Miller,Hobart,Lincoln. There is a reason why they cost more. If anybody says those brands are the same as the HF or what you buy off amazon they are highly mistaken!

It's kind of like the gas truck guys bashing the Diesel guys. I think it's because they did not Pony up the money in the beginning for the better equipment and they try to justify their poor decisions!!

A old man once told me. It only costs a nickel more to go 1st class!

Goodpost stucknutz !

Just like most of you boys would not buy a chinese tractor or truck if your life depended on it.

The same thing applies to chinese welders, you get what you pay for...

 

[paulsharvey]

Goodpost stucknutz !

Just like most of you boys would not buy a chinese tractor or truck if your life depended on it.

The same thing applies to chinese welders, you get what you pay for...

So, your not 100% wrong; But; let's say our OP has a budget of $500-600. IMO, he's better dropping $250-300 on the welder; and spending the other $250-300 on wire, helmet, gloves. I really think a he's going to be better off with 25# of wire and a $250 machine, than a $600 machine, with the 2.2# of wire that comes with it, and using his safety squints.

Now, if he was a budget of $1200; yes, a $800 machine, and $400 of consumables/accessories is the way to go.

In the end, your going to want to Practice, and that takes wire. The more #s you run, the better your going to be; and no ammount of machine budget will make up for that. Inversely, no ammount of practice will change the base spec if the machine, so think about the end use, and what all yiu want to weld, and get something that can do a bit more.

 

[YanmarFever]

He could buy a used American machine for a lot cheaper than a new one off craigslist, face book, ect....

 

[5030]

I'm glad we got our information right finally. Unlike the last thread about wire!

OP: Cant go wrong with Miller,Hobart,Lincoln. There is a reason why they cost more. If anybody says those brands are the same as the HF or what you buy off amazon they are highly mistaken!

It's kind of like the gas truck guys bashing the Diesel guys. I think it's because they did not Pony up the money in the beginning for the better equipment and they try to justify their poor decisions!!

A old man once told me. It only costs a nickel more to go 1st class!

My final comment to that simply is, an older (over 10 year old machine and not a new one simply because new machines are almost all IGBT machines today and the IGBT semi conductors as well as many, many other electric and electronic parts in any of them including Miller, Lincoln, ESAB, Fronius and others, all come from across the pond. There are NO domestic producers of IGBT semi conductors here presently and the HF machines are using the same IGBT semi conductors that everyone else is using. How it works so get your head out of the sand and face reality.

In my case anything I buy is business related. All my equipment including my farm equipment is a deductible (tax) business expense. None of it is 'hobby' related, not al all, consequently, being a business owner, I always strive to buy the best (and often times) least expensive equipment that will augment my business with the minimum amount of capital expense and by the way, I'm tax exempt at HF. I have a exemption certificate on file with them in California.

Why would I pay a premium price for say a Lincoln TIG machine or say a Hyper Therm plasma cutter when I can buy very comparable models (with the same specifications) for less, in the case of the HF equipment, a lot less. To do that would be financially insane.

When I buy anything, from farm equipment to shop equipment, I always carefully research the equipment I'm about to purchase, always and how those purchases impact my bottom line.

Not a hobby deal with me at all. It's all business related and all about making money (and paying taxes) as well.

 

[old and tired]

IEastwood has one on sale right now, seems well received. Unsure what to look for… 110v is all my house has right now.

Is this the one you are looking at???

Eastwood 90 Amp MIG and Flux Welder - EASY Welding

Never Welded? No Problem! True 90 Amp MIG Welder is a Perfect First Welder Industry leading 3 Year Warranty Confidence backed 90 day trial period Weld up to 1/8

www.eastwood.com

 

[YanmarFever]

Are you SURE this is your final comment??

 

[WranglerX]

One condition nobody really seems to be discussing, is "fluxcore only" (FCAW) or "solid wire/shield gas" (GMAW).... Over the years I have gravitated to GMAW process almost exclusively, only forced to use FCAW when conditions demand, such as dirty materials and breeze conditions..... IF you are going to consider any welder anything that is one system only (FCAW) should not even be considered.... IF you get dual use system it does not mean you have to add gas, but later you may want to, if you system is FCAW you will need to replace complete welder to get gas capabilities......I been using my HH 140 for 10-12 years and still have half the roll of fluxcore demo wire that can with it.... My only regret is that I didn't get something that was 120/240 volt like the HH 210MVP....

 

[YanmarFever]

The Hobart 210mvp with the aluminum spool gun is the one I purchased a year ago, after I sold all my equipment before I moved.
I couldn't take the welding table it was to large, so I had to weld up another one at the new place.

 

[stucknutz]

My final comment to that simply is, an older (over 10 year old machine and not a new one simply because new machines are almost all IGBT machines today and the IGBT semi conductors as well as many, many other electric and electronic parts in any of them including Miller, Lincoln, ESAB, Fronius and others, all come from across the pond. There are NO domestic producers of IGBT semi conductors here presently and the HF machines are using the same IGBT semi conductors that everyone else is using. How it works so get your head out of the sand and face reality.

In my case anything I buy is business related. All my equipment including my farm equipment is a deductible (tax) business expense. None of it is 'hobby' related, not al all, consequently, being a business owner, I always strive to buy the best (and often times) least expensive equipment that will augment my business with the minimum amount of capital expense and by the way, I'm tax exempt at HF. I have a exemption certificate on file with them in California.

Why would I pay a premium price for say a Lincoln TIG machine or say a Hyper Therm plasma cutter when I can buy very comparable models (with the same specifications) for less, in the case of the HF equipment, a lot less. To do that would be financially insane.

When I buy anything, from farm equipment to shop equipment, I always carefully research the equipment I'm about to purchase, always and how those purchases impact my bottom line.

Not a hobby deal with me at all. It's all business related and all about making money (and paying taxes) as well.

I believe everyone get's your point about Inverter based machines. I certainly am not doubting that however, there still is real differences between inverter machine vs inverter machine regardless of where the parts come from. Here are some examples:

1. Wave Forms
2. Pulse frequency's
3. AC Frequency's
4. timer's and delay's
5. Arc Stability.
And the list keeps going and going.

Now one might say well my HF welder has all of those "Features"

Well sure they do but how good is that HF welder performing those said features. Let me answer it for you Poorly. This is truly where the rubber meets the road between "knock off" vs Miller,Lincoln,Esab,Fronius

There is a reason why the Lincoln and Miller's of the world have proprietary wave forms and frequency's and guard that with a heavy council.

So to say they are basically the same is the furthest from the truth.

Since everything you point to is related to your "business" and not hobby I wish you the best. Because in the fabrication world technology = Less cycle time = lower cost per part = Happy customers = More money in my pocket. I'm just glad my hobby welders are better then some business's welders out there!

 

[5030]

Hands on experience welding stainless, aluminum and even titanium with excellent results tells me their machine perform as advertised. Far as waveform is concerned, I had an sold a Lincoln Square Wave Weldpack TIG machine with a water cooler on it and the Vulcan I now have and use can run rings around the Lincoln. Only plus side to the Lincoln was it was a transformer machine and I prefer a transformer machine over an IGBT machine and always have. IGBT machines while cutting edge will never be as robust as a transformer machine, why I keep the pair of Hobart Handlers I own as well.

Far as plasma cutters are concerned, I don't see or feel any difference between the Hyper Therm I had and the Titanium's I own now except the HT consumables were at least 4 times the price of the Titanium consumables and I use a lot of consumables with the CNC Plasma table. It was a matter of running costs that made me sell the HT and switch to the Titanium plasma machines. One thing to note and that is, I kept the HT interface cable as it mates right up to the Titanium 65 amp machine and the 65 amp already has the multi pin voltage splitter connector on the front of it as well and my THC works just fine as well.

If I had not had an astounding offer to buy both the Square Wave Lincoln as well as the HT Plasma cutter, I'd still be using them. Only reason why I purchased the Vulcan and the Titanium machines actually.

I basically sold both machines and gave the new owner one of my 125 cubic foot gas bottles and walked away after purchasing 3 machines and I put over 2500 bucks in my savings account. He was happy, I was more than happy and we get to live ever after....

 

[Oaktree]

Personally I prefer American made (or maybe assemble) HOBART welder, I have a Hobart Handler 140 .... It is a 120 Volt machine with 5 preset heats, and will run either shield gas (solid wire) or fluxcore wire..... Will weld up to 1/4 inch material at top heats with ease....The only thing I found is to use top heat the requirement ( by documentation) for a 20 amp circuit to be false, I did my home work and found that it require at about 25 amps to run at top heat, so to keep from tripping breaker I upped my welders AC supply circuit to a 30 AMP.... About 10 years now and don't remember how many rolls of wire through it and still happy with it....

I have the same unit as you and I'm happy with it. Welding just seemed like a useful skill to have, always wanted to be able to do it so I picked this up maybe 10-12 years ago. Maybe an HF would have been good enough for the amount I use it, but they didn't have a store here at the time.

Flux core will do the work you are talking about. The limitation is welds don't look as nice as mig with gas shielding - but a mig system is more complex to store, move around, set up. I've used flux core exclusively for 15 years for my farm repairs, and don't see a need to go to mig. Nobody is going to critique the beauty of my welds.

Most of my MIG welds look bad enough. They seem to do the job and no one sees them but me. Never tried flux welding, though I ought to...won't have to move my projects inside all the time.

 

[paulsharvey]

Not relevant to our OP, but know a gas line welder (local gas company, former travel pipeline welder), who says his Lincoln Ranger is out preformed by a $250 inverter Stick/DC Tig machine so much, he uses the Ranger for the outlet to feed the dtick/Tig. Take that as you want. Our OP won't be well served sinking $6.5k into a Ranger or Miller. I would keep an eye out for a used machine; BUT, replacement parts on a used Miller will cost more than many imports.

Based on our OPs statements; I would look for
A: Dual voltage, not only 110V
B: Flux and gas, just to add that on later
C: something with 'normal' tips/cups/liners
D: atleast 40% duty cycle at max/near max power; maybe 20%, but some Cheap machines only have like 10% or less at max power, which Sucks
E: warranty and/or replacement parts
F: don't believe all the old myths about 1970s/1980s USA stuff lasting forever/amazing welds/unkillable; they might have been tough, but they are dinosaurs, and probably don't suit a new starter; it's nice to see your actual voltage, wire speed, and have infinite control
G: if it was just hi-low power and wire speed settings, or so.ething like A/B/C/D, run, you want to be able to set your speeds/power to what you want
H: bad wire on a good machine runs like crap, good wire can make a poor machine run better, good helmet make Your welds better, so spend the money on better wire/helmet/gloves
I: if your weld works for you, take that as win; not everything has to be for Instagram/weldporn

 

[paulsharvey]

I like a multi process set up, mig/Stick. Now, part of that is, I have like 120 lbs of rods that I got for $3.00.

 

[Yogi05]

Just read the whole thread and in some ways more confused than when I started.

I have a very old Kodiak flux core mig that never worked right. Feed issues, and only setting is a high/low switch.
I haven't needed a welder for around 20 yrs, but I find I could use one here and there now, so.....

I bought a cheapo 3 in 1 from amazon that I can not even begin to pronounce the name of. I chose one based
on price, reviews, and hours of videos reviewing that exact model. $128 Cdn, which I think is like $900 Usd

Plugged it in for the first time about 3 hours ago. Read the instructions and all that first. Double checked my set up. then
touched the mig torch to some metal ...... nothing. Re-checked everything. Nothing.
Put the MMA torch on and got some sparks. Wasn't worried about actually trying to weld anything at the moment.
Back to the FC mig, nothing. (Electrode negative BTW)

Any guesses why I get nothing from one torch and something from the other?

This is a 200a machine, and I admit I don't know much about that stuff so I read some charts I printed to check amps etc.
and still no mig.

I gave up quickly because I didn't want the machine flying across the yard yet.

Back to the net to see if I could figure out what I'm doing wrong, and discovered I don't even know if the screen is showing amps or volts.
It's some kind of magical machine that when you set one parameter, other parameters like wire feed set automatically.
Went to manufacturer site and noticed some of their other similar machines show a dial marked V and some marked A, so I glean because mine is marked with an A, it must be showing amps (goes from 20 to 200). BTW, the manual is VERY vague and poorly written.

It uses 0.8 wire at the moment, which is .030.

Is it possible I just need to crank my amps up to get any kind of mig reaction? I only went as high as 75 on the screen but figured that should have given me something.

I was going to buy a FC mig from our version of HF because of the return/exchange policy like HF, but they go on sale for $138 and they sell out like Pink Floyd tickets. You almost need to meet the truck dropping them off to get one.

Hoping I don't have to return a faulty machine, and I'm just doing something stupid.

I had to learn to weld about 40 yrs ago to get a mechanics license, but never used electric welding for my job, lots of oxy/acetylene though. I was
never good with the MMA/mig to begin with.

Here's the exact model I bought if it makes thing clearer for anyone who may be able to help.

 

[paulsharvey]

Just read the whole thread and in some ways more confused than when I started.

I have a very old Kodiak flux core mig that never worked right. Feed issues, and only setting is a high/low switch.
I haven't needed a welder for around 20 yrs, but I find I could use one here and there now, so.....

I bought a cheapo 3 in 1 from amazon that I can not even begin to pronounce the name of. I chose one based
on price, reviews, and hours of videos reviewing that exact model. $128 Cdn, which I think is like $900 Usd

Plugged it in for the first time about 3 hours ago. Read the instructions and all that first. Double checked my set up. then
touched the mig torch to some metal ...... nothing. Re-checked everything. Nothing.
Put the MMA torch on and got some sparks. Wasn't worried about actually trying to weld anything at the moment.
Back to the FC mig, nothing. (Electrode negative BTW)

Any guesses why I get nothing from one torch and something from the other?

This is a 200a machine, and I admit I don't know much about that stuff so I read some charts I printed to check amps etc.
and still no mig.

I gave up quickly because I didn't want the machine flying across the yard yet.

Back to the net to see if I could figure out what I'm doing wrong, and discovered I don't even know if the screen is showing amps or volts.
It's some kind of magical machine that when you set one parameter, other parameters like wire feed set automatically.
Went to manufacturer site and noticed some of their other similar machines show a dial marked V and some marked A, so I glean because mine is marked with an A, it must be showing amps (goes from 20 to 200). BTW, the manual is VERY vague and poorly written.

It uses 0.8 wire at the moment, which is .030.

Is it possible I just need to crank my amps up to get any kind of mig reaction? I only went as high as 75 on the screen but figured that should have given me something.

I was going to buy a FC mig from our version of HF because of the return/exchange policy like HF, but they go on sale for $138 and they sell out like Pink Floyd tickets. You almost need to meet the truck dropping them off to get one.

Hoping I don't have to return a faulty machine, and I'm just doing something stupid.

I had to learn to weld about 40 yrs ago to get a mechanics license, but never used electric welding for my job, lots of oxy/acetylene though. I was
never good with the MMA/mig to begin with.

Here's the exact model I bought if it makes thing clearer for anyone who may be able to help.

View attachment 861007

So, got some questions, and please don't take any offense if I ask something stupid:
1) when the mig gun is plugged in, powered up, does wire feed out the gun? if not, does the feed rollers try to feed? if the feed rollers roll, but not wire, is the gun and whip held out from the machine at a more or less straight run?

2) If wire is feeding out the gun, do you have good ground contact, both on the work piece, as well as the dinse connector on the machine?

3) does the machine have a switch or dial that needs to be reset for Mig/FCAW?

 

[paulsharvey]

It 'sounds' to me like there is a setting that needs changed, to the mig whip, and then possibly, the Amps read out will also turn to Volts? The picture, stock picture I assume, you see how the mig gun symbol is lit up in orange, was your similar when you tried

 

[WranglerX]

At least most of us can pronounce "Miller" or "Hobart" or "Lincoln".....

 

[AirOpsMgr]

Just read the whole thread and in some ways more confused than when I started.

Don't feel bad, I'm confused as well ... one member in this thread is relentlessly poo poo'ing all over "Chinese" parts, but then claims most of what he uses professionally is from Harbor Freight ... Definition of a hypocrite? So yeah, hard to follow some of these posts, lol

I too am in the market for a basic welder, but have only used the higher-end units that we keep in our maintenance shops a few times, just to learn and fix a couple of small personal items. I'm nowhere close to stacking dimes, but my handful of attempts aren't too horrible, so I think I'm ready to get one of my own.

I need practice and will start small as I'll only use a welder once every few months around my property. Thinking I'll try the HF "Titanium stick 225 inverter welder" and see how it works out.

 

[Yogi05]

So, got some questions, and please don't take any offense if I ask something stupid:
1) when the mig gun is plugged in, powered up, does wire feed out the gun? if not, does the feed rollers try to feed? if the feed rollers roll, but not wire, is the gun and whip held out from the machine at a more or less straight run?

2) If wire is feeding out the gun, do you have good ground contact, both on the work piece, as well as the dinse connector on the machine?

3) does the machine have a switch or dial that needs to be reset for Mig/FCAW?

Appreciate the help.
1) Everything is set up as it should be. Wire feeds well. (Feed problem I mentioned in my novel was the old welder.)
2) Connections on the machine are good as built. Twist and lock. Checked them at first fault. Ground contact might be sketchy
but I did scratch the metal a bit with sand paper. Just 2 small pieces to practice with. I also did something I am reluctantly admitting...
I smacked the ground clamp with the torch/wire looking for spark. nothing.
3) That pic is exactly my machine. The feed was set to mig. You cycle through the little pictures to match. Although I have no idea what the AI position on the bottom left is for. Manual doesn't do anything but tell you name.

 

[Yogi05]

It 'sounds' to me like there is a setting that needs changed, to the mig whip, and then possibly, the Amps read out will also turn to Volts? The picture, stock picture I assume, you see how the mig gun symbol is lit up in orange, was your similar when you tried

Stock picture but my model. I was under the impression when researching welders that you could switch the volts or amps according to your own preferences, but in hind-sight, it may have been one or more of the other brands I spent hours comparing.
The symbol is highlighted in a hard to see orange. I guess to compliment the orange logo writing etc.??

Based on the turnable knob having an A beside it (1 o'clock position) I think it's safe to say it's programmed in amps.

To that end, what would be a setting for 1/8 metal. Test pieces. Should I have cranked that setting higher than 75 when testing?