welder choice...

Hello, I am thinking of buying a welder for myself, I have absolutely no experience in this area other than a little tinkering from time to time years ago. The main thing I am wanting to do right now is have something I can do some exhaust welding with. I am thinking of turboing the 6.5 I currently have in my M1008, and possibly down the road fabricating a winch mount. The little bit I do know leads me to believe that the unit I have linked to below would work for the exhaust work, but I dont know if it would work for anything much heaver. If this unit is not good for what I am wanting to do, maybe someone could suggest a unit better suited to my needs, as I said I dont plan on anything heavy duty. I would like to stay with a 110v unit if this is possible.
Thanks much for your time!

Greg

http://www.harborfreight.com/90-amp-flux-wire-welder-68887-8494.html

110 volts will limit you to smaller "hobby" welders. Hobart makes the 187 Handler MIG welder. It's 220v and works well around the shop/farm. Priced reasonable. Tractor Supply stocks them and supports supplies and accessories. They even have the mixed gas bottled.
JC

As stated, 110v is going to limit how thick of plate you can weld, and for how long.
However, if your stuck on wanting a 110v welder, id look at a Miller Millermatic 212MVP. Its a dual voltage machine, so when you find 110v isn't enough, you can plug in to 220v and use the full machines potential.

What he said, you will be a lot happier.

Miller or Hobart MIG welder , both made by the same company and pretty well supported . I would also recommend a MVP welder . 110 welder is really going to limit your ability to weld heavier gauge material . Like they said TSC with a sale or coupon , and use gas and not the FLUX coated wire . Also IMHO stay FAR away from the OFF SHORE welders , price maybe be cheaper , but try and find parts !

There are a few things I stay away from at HF, welders are one of them. Most of these welds will produce a bead on very thin stuff but a decent welder will be much more easier to use, especially for a beginner.

Stick with a name brand welder (Lincoln, Miller, Hobart, etc).

Thank you all for your help in this so far, my main reason for wanting to stay 110 was just simply not wanting to run a 220 line out to my garage, but it seems like it will be well worth the little work it will be! As I said I have never really done any welding, does anyone have a good source for the basics, stuff like staying away from the flux core and going with gas? I know I have so much to learn to really get started on this and any good resources for me to read on would be great!

Thanks much!!
Greg

Get a big size lens automatic hood and get a mig welder with the gas shielding. Get a good clean ground spot for the ground clamp and learn to watch the molten puddle form and move the stinger as needed. Get your head close enough to see what is going on but keep out of the fumes. On body metal weld let cool and move around to avoid burn through. In spot welding seams the end of the feed wire will glow just long enough for you to see to get set over your next spot weld and avoid welding off the seam. Practice, Practice Practice with heat settings , wire feed speeds. When it sounds like you are frying bacon things are going pretty good. I have the small 110 volt Lincoln wire feed welder with 0.25 wire for body metal using mixed gas with an automatic hood .Good luck and have fun.

Would strongly encourage you to take a look at Miller's Multimatic 200. Amazing little machine.

There are all kinds of books out there about welding and you can find some good youtube vids.

Here's a pretty good welding forum- http://www.hobartwelders.com/weldtalk/

Lincoln or Miller is like the Ford verses Chevy argument.

I grew up with Lincoln machines and now own two of them. Both are 220 volt and set up for flux core.

My older machine was Lincoln's first small 220 machine, it is over 20 years old. It is called a SP130T, they later called it a SP170T and it is now redesigned into the SP180T.

For the last couple of projects I have run it at its limit.

I recently purchased a Power Mig 216 and this machine is awesome.

The 110 machines will work for the thin metal but will not be powerful enough for your winch mount.

I would suggest you look at the Lincoln Power Mig 180 Dual. This is a dual voltage machine.

Get a good auto darkening helmet. They are so cheap today. I got one free with the new welder. It is much better than my old one.

Get a good welding jacket or cape and bib set. The canvas is good for most bench welding. For overhead and out of position welding I wear leathers.

On my dominant hand I use a thin non insulated welding glove. On my support hand I wear a welding glove with a heat resistant pad on the back side.

As far as learning to weld I would look to see if the local adult education, vocational school or community college offers welding classes. I had the opportunity to be taught by the welder a that worked on the nuclear power plant.

Remember

Practice

Practice

Practice

The old welders around here say Lincoln for stick and Miller for MIG. As said above, Ford vs Chevy.

Only Lincoln machine I have is a old Pipeliner, everything else is Miller (Stick, MIG, TIG, plasma). To me, the Millers just seem to have more options on the same size welder over the Lincoln.

Basically, Hobart machines are the older model Miller (Miller owns Hobart). If you don't need the latest tech in a welder, you can same a little money with Hobart. When I was buying a buzz box for the home shop, Hobart had the old 200amp AC/DC machine, Miller had come out with the new 300 amp AC/DC machine. I went with the Miller just for the extra capacity.

The main thing to look at with any welder (especially MIG) is duty cycle. The main reason I went with the Miller above was not that I ever needed to weld at 300amps, it was because the duty cycle over the whole amperage range was quite a bit more than the Hobart 200amp machine. The last thing you want is to spend more time letting your welder cool off than you do actually welding, and that's what you'll have with a small amperage machine with 20% duty cycle (weld for 2 min, let the welder cool off for 8 min).

The red, lincoln, or blue, miller, debate will go on forever.

Both companies make good machines.

My mechanic is a diehard blue, miller,man but his mig machine is red, a lincoln.

Duty cycle is important once you are experienced. Before you have the experience a machine with a higher duty cycle can lead to issues with heat warping the metal.

Gas shielded solid wire requires higher amperage than flux core wire to weld the same thickness on material.

What it will boil down to is what brand can you get the best support for in your area.

As a distributor for welding supplies, I will tell you to buy your machine at a welding supply company and not a discount place. Especially if you purchase a Lincoln. The welder they sell at Lowes/Home Depot and big box stores looks a lot like the ones sold at Praxair or Airgas, but internally they are different. Hence the reason theirs is cheaper than the ones we sell. But the first time something goes wrong the people come to Airgas and Praxair for service, and they don't handle the parts due to different distribution channels. The Hobarts mentioned are about 95% Miller parts, but a much higher quality than the Lincoln economy/consumer grade machines. If you go to a welding distributor, inquire about the Tweco-Thermal Arc 3 in 1 machines. The 211i has multivoltage capability but they also have the ability to do multiple processes of mig, stick and tig. Price wise they are competitive against the miller and Lincoln. (parent company is Victor technologies of victor torches).

Lincoln makes a nice 110/220 machine, after a while you will appreciate the 220 side...110 is nice for really thin stuff but not much more! And, yes, the Red and Blu argument has been going on for ages and will continue...It is VERY worthwhile running the 220 to where you will be working!

One thing that has not been brought up is that the 110 machines need a 20 amp, or larger, circuit to operate at there potential. Most 110 circuits are 15 amp.

The 220 machines will work on an electric dryer circuit.

Yes you can make extension cords for the welders. They are just heavy and not that cheap

I have a 110 Miller and love it. I don't do anything over 1/8 inch so it works for me. If I was going to do it again I would go to 220 just so I had the option to do thicker stuff.

I use a Millermatic 252 when I'm working in the shop at work all the time and it always does the job. We also have a Thermal Arc 3-in-1 machine, but like anything else that tries to do to much, it does an OK job at everything. Lincoln makes great generator welders, I have one on my welding rig, but their shop machines just never match up to Miller machines in features or weld quality. This is obviously my opinion, but it seems to be a pretty popular one with every welder I talk to. I won a small Lincoln 110v mig welder, and for at home small jobs it does work, but use shielding gas.

NJDEUCE said:

I use a Millermatic 252 when I'm working in the shop at work all the time and it always does the job. We also have a Thermal Arc 3-in-1 machine, but like anything else that tries to do to much, it does an OK job at everything. Lincoln makes great generator welders, I have one on my welding rig, but their shop machines just never match up to Miller machines in features or weld quality. This is obviously my opinion, but it seems to be a pretty popular one with every welder I talk to. I won a small Lincoln 110v mig welder, and for at home small jobs it does work, but use shielding gas.

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I've got a 251 (older model of the 252). It is a nice machine and handles anything I want to do.

I've also got a Miller Deltaweld 451 that a guy gave me that wouldn't work. Turns out all it needed was a on/off switch. That thing's a monster and bigger than anything I need. It's 3ph only which also limits it's usefulness but it will lay down some weld, fast.