MIG Welder for Beginner/Light Use

[TripleS]

You need to hit the trigger while the wire is touching the ground

 

[Yogi05]

Oh FFS !!
If it wasn't so dark out I'd go set the thing up again and try to run a bead on the hood of my car.
If it didn't work, I'm no further behind.
If I weld my hood, it's punishment for not thinking of that. I figured the trigger only ran the wire feed. No electricity.
In my defense, the manual is a very poorly translated document, and doesn't actually spell out things like that the way
a "welding for dummies" book might.

 

[paulsharvey]

Oh FFS !!
If it wasn't so dark out I'd go set the thing up again and try to run a bead on the hood of my car.
If it didn't work, I'm no further behind.
If I weld my hood, it's punishment for not thinking of that. I figured the trigger only ran the wire feed. No electricity.
In my defense, the manual is a very poorly translated document, and doesn't actually spell out things like that the way
a "welding for dummies" book might.

That's how the absolute bottom of the barrel, Chicago Electric AC one worked, but 99% of them do not send current without trigger pulled.

 

[AirOpsMgr]

Oh FFS !!
If it wasn't so dark out I'd go set the thing up again and try to run a bead on the hood of my car.
If it didn't work, I'm no further behind.
If I weld my hood, it's punishment for not thinking of that. I figured the trigger only ran the wire feed. No electricity.
In my defense, the manual is a very poorly translated document, and doesn't actually spell out things like that the way
a "welding for dummies" book might.

Hope that resolves it for ya, and heck man, don't feel bad, we're all human and nobody is an expert on everything (well, most of us commoners, at least ) ... Chalk it up to a learning experience and now you can provide helpful feedback if someone has a similar issue in the future.

That's the best part of the internet and forums like this, we get to learn from the advice of hundreds if not thousands of others.

 

[BigGG]

That's how the absolute bottom of the barrel, Chicago Electric AC one worked, but 99% of them do not send current without trigger pulled.

I think the majority of the old transformer MIGs kept the wire hot (my Craftsman does too), but my Yes doesn't, only when you pull the trigger.

 

[WranglerX]

I think the majority of the old transformer MIGs kept the wire hot (my Craftsman does too), but my Yes doesn't, only when you pull the trigger.

I though only BOTTOM of barrel old 70 AMP HF welder had a full time hot wire.... Guess if most people were no so cheap, they could get a decent welder with trigger control for weld voltage/current/wire feed..... This is why I try to stay towards the middle/upper end of cost/quality.....Kind of learned this working with power tools while doing fabrications for like 60 years now.....

 

[California]

I think those old HF cheapest AC 'MIG' (flux) welders, the blue ones, were marketed exclusively for beginners who didn't know any better.

After doing decent work with an ancient 230A-AC stick welder I bought HF's 'MIG-90'. It was hopeless. Returned it. I saw a huge number of them on Ebay 'as-new, open box' offered by a liquidator.

A year later after reading about a bad flux wire issue I bought the same thing again. Yep, HF had included such bad wire with the first shipment of that model that the welders were simply un-usable and it seemed near all of them were returned for refund. Note HF's flux wire is labelled DC ONLY so they know their AC flux-wire 'MIG's are bogus.

This second one was adequate for some simple projects within its narrow range of available settings. I eventually replaced this with a used 110v Century DC MIG with similar claimed specs but far better results.

One thing I learned, if a 110v welder claims much more than 90~100 amps output then it has to be run from a 30 amp circuit - which nobody has, without running a new circuit. At that point you might as well have gone with a 240 v welder and circuit.

 

[TractorTYMe]

I have a Vulcan 215 MIG from HF, it can use argon/co2 or just plan argon for cover gas and runs on 115/240v. I'm a newb, so I use wire with flux core still. Works pretty good for what I need.

 

[paulsharvey]

One thing I learned, if a 110v welder claims much more than 90~100 amps output then it has to be run from a 30 amp circuit - which nobody has, without running a new circuit. At that point you might as well have gone with a 240 v welder and circuit.

I would always say dual voltage is better, however, through modern electrical trickery and magic, they really are able to do a lot more with 120V machines then they could 15 years ago.

 

[California]

... through modern electrical trickery and magic, they really are able to do a lot more with 120V machines then they could 15 years ago.

Yeah. But there's a limit. 120 volts and 20 amps as input, 120 x 20 =2400 watts.

Then 20 volts output welding current and 2400 watts energy available, gives 120 amps theoretical maximum output.

Reduce that by some percentage for the inefficiency of the transformer in a cheap welder and you're back to 90 amps output, maximum. A modern solid state welder will do better but if its 100% efficient it still has that 2400 watt limit.