Soundguy,I know you don't know as much about welding as me,no need for you to say that,so,,listen.
Basics,,,you don't try and weld something in one pass unless its thin,,,like I've said,,how do you all think they weld a 1 inch thick piece of pipe or plate that needs to be a full penatration weld?,,by using a 2 inch rod at 500 amps??? no,,they make multiple passes,,using 1/8 rod and 5/32 rod,,[maybe even some 3/16 rod],,they use the bigger rod for speed,,,but you can weld up 1 inch plate and have it pass x-ray and a bend test with 1/8 rod at about 125 amps or so,,you make multiple passes,[look at it like a whole bunch of little welds tied into each other],,,,just telling you all the facts.
Some welding salesman started this stuff of this mig machine will weld this thick a steel in one pass stuff,,makes no since to a welder however,,cause thats not how you go about welding something,,,,maybe sheetmetal.
And when you start using dc current ep,,you don't want anymore of them 6011,,you use 6010,,and 7018,,,get some 3/32 for thin stuff,,get some 1/8 for thicker stuff,,like I said,,,a 1/8 rod uses about 125 amps of dc power,,,but the way the duty cycle works out on these machines is you need about a 180-200 amp machine to use that 1/8 rod for any length of time,,,this is why you need a bigger machine,duty cycle,,,,not to run a 3/16 rod,,,,plus with a machine thats about a 200 amp,,you can use 5/32 rods,when you want to fill up something faster,,,plus you could do some carbon arc gouging with it,if you ever had some old nasty welds to remove,,,thingy
