I know this subject has been beat to death, but I did do a search here and really didn`t see what I was looking for. First off, I will thank you in advance for the immense knowledge found on the site. Here`s the deal --- I`ve had a Lincoln 225 arc welder for years. I`ve been "stick welding" for over 20 years. I consider myself pretty good. I`ve done a couple of Camaro clips and shortened a few pickup frames, along with tons of other steel fabrication projects. The truth is, I know NOTHING about MIG, TIG or anything besides old school stick welding. I`ve never even attempted to use a wire-feed welder. At 43 years of age, I desperately want to learn to weld stainless, aluminum and have the ability to weld body panels. So please educate me. Can I do anything with one of the $150 ( 90 amp ) flux wire welders you see at Harbor Freight or is this a waste ? Exactly what equipment do I need to do this type welding and where do I get it and what does it cost ? Again, THANK YOU all, in advance, for your wealth of knowledge. I love this site.
From what I've gathered in previous posts is what ever you get from Harbor Freight is junk and to save up for a few extra weeks and get something that will last you as long as you've had that Lincoln.
A close friend of mine bought the Harbor Freight one and literally had to give it away two months later - no one would buy it. The welds had no penetration, and could be picked off by hand!
well you can start tig welding you have the welder. you can get outfited with with a scratch tig for a couple hundred minus the argon. as far as the mig goes i have miller 225(i think thats the number) i would stick with the name you know as a welder. miller, Lincoln, red arc hobert. the best advise i can give you is play around you know what you look for your a welder
Please tell me more about this. I have heard about this before but never got any info as yet. thanks in advance ...John
you will do fine with a wire feed if you can do stick, it will actually be easier but you will have to spend about $650 for a 220 volt wire feed with gas shielding and that is not big enough for heavy metal, the Lincon would be a fine machine as a Miller also dont waste your time and money on anyting less
is your welder an AC only box or AC/DC? I think the guys talking about adding TIG to it are assuming it's DC?
Figured i'd give you my .02 cents worth. I have a mig and a tig welder. Mig welding isn't all that much different than stick welding. It just uses a different type of shielding and the wire is continually fed. You could pick up mig welding really quick. But if you want to be able to weld aluminum, that takes a different gas and you need to use a spool gun. As far as tig welding, you can tig weld any type of metal. Steel, aluminum. stainless steel. It all uses the same gas, argon. Different electrodes though. It is harder to learn than mig. As far as cost, buy from a well known company. Both of mine are Miller. As long as you stick with Miller, Hobart, and Lincoln you'll be fine. If you keep your eyes open you can probablly pick up a nice mig or tig on Craig's list or the local classifieds. Forget Harbor Freight junk. Hope this helps.
What do you mean by "different electrodes" I always used tungsten when doing TIG. Never changed em, just put a new point on them.. Is this wrong?
Different tungsten for different materials - 2% thoriated [RED] for steel, stainless, Green,Yellow and brown for aluminum, magnesium. But unlike stick, with mig you can push & pull and run down hill as well as uphill and you don't have to chip !!!!
Guys - my Lincoln welder is AC only. It`s one of those little red ones that you can buy at Lowes for about $250. Thank you all for the advice so far. Really helpful. I`m hoping to teach my 16 yr old the ropes. He has shown an interest and he will certainly be in need of skills for a career soon.
Start checking your local Craig's list. You might stumble on a Mig or Tig set up reasonable. Also, a good site is weldingweb.com. Guys post pictures of their welds there and knowledgeable folks give advice and suggestions, just like here.
My dad bought the Harbour freight .The 220 version It works ok You need the gas conversion. I bought a cheap Astro 110 With gas conversion Argon/co2 Works ok on sheetmetal.If you can afford the miller go for it,You definately need the gas .Tigs on the other hand The only thing I've read is Water cooled machine is the best and hf machines are probably cheaply made.Tigs are a softer weld with less warpage and migs are a harder weld.In my own opinion Mig is probably gonna be the easiest for you to Just do.You have the weave.The cheaper migs have rocker switches for the heat settings, and more expensive units have dial controls for heat settings.And as far as guage settings for gas Starting 22 -27 That works pretty good on mine.The weirdest thing and Im no expert is I get a better weld using flux core wire with the gas .
If you buy a mig get one with either continuously variable knobs, or one with like 10 clicks on each knob. The cheapies tend to have more like 4 clicks on each knob, taking away a ton of adjustability. A talented welder can make do with 4 clicks. A hack like me (or a starting welder) really needs infinite adjustability in the machine to help compensate for technique.
The question was asked about, air cooled/scratch-start TIG torches. Yes, these do work, and are easy to setup on an DC stick machine(you do have to be able to change polarity of the leads). They do require argon gas, and being air/gas cooled, it will use more gas. The cost of argon is a definate consideration when choosing between air/gas cooled and water-cooled. If you want to be able to weld aluminum too you'll need an AC/DC machine, and a hi frequency box. This can all be purchased in a package, or assembled from add-ons/upgrades. Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith
While you are waiting and looking for a good MIG and TIG teach your 16 old to stick weld good and he will thank you some day. I know guys who can MIG/TIG well but can't stick weld for Ka-ka.
I would also agree with 'roundvalley' about teaching your son to stick weld. It is a good base for learning to weld. For automotive uses, I'd say it is more useful for chassis/bracket fabrication etc. Not for body work. If you were to teach him to gas weld too, he'd have a great start to doing the body side of automotive welding. MIG and TIG are nice upgrades, with more refined applications. They are not nessessary to being able to build. With the basics, stick and oxy/ace welding you can do just about all of the common hotrod fabrication duties. Throw in a vertical bandsaw, a cutting torch, a drill-press, a bench grinder and a hand held grinder, you are ready! Good luck with your son! Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith
does anyone have input on the AC Arc add-on stitch welder for occasional sheet metal work?? http://www.eastwood.com/stitch-welder-welding-rods-not-included-1.html
Always buy more than what you think you will need. I have a Montgomery Ward AC/DC machine with a Sears high freq adapter sitting in the shed. I tried to build a tig machine. It worked for a while but turned out to be a waste of money. Save the money that you will waste on a wannabe welder and put it toward something that you can grow into instead of out of. You will always be able to recoup some of your investment with good quality name brand welding equipment. (you'd like to find one right?) Try that with a Harbor Freight when you out grow it. A quality name brand welder can be serviced by the pros with parts availability if necessary. I have no brand loyalty. More strategy than brand recommendation. JMHO
You already have a stick welder for the heavy stuff, so in my opinion, you don't need a 220v mig, especially if money is tight. I have been using a 115v Lincoln for over 15 years and never had a problem, and can weld damned near anything on a car. My son is a welder where he works, but just recently bought one for himself. He wanted to buy a Clark 115v welder off ebay, and I tried to talk him out of it, he did it anyway, since he's laid off and just couldn't afford anything else and couldn't find a good used big name machine. I gotta admit, it's a nice little welder, and I've read a lot of good things about them. But if money's not a problem, I'd still go with a big name. A lot of guys will knock them, but 115v welders have their good points, especially when you have a stick for the heavy stuff.
In my opinion with so many QUALITY domestic machines available at what I think are REASONABLE prices, why settle for a POS import machine that will end up being a BAD DEAL despite it "economy pricing". (Years ago I bought one of those pos little imports, just trash) It has already been said that a person should buy more welder than they think they will need, I can agree with this also. I have a 110V Lincoln welder (a nice little machine) that I paid about $450.00 for. Shortly after I started using it I discovered that it did not get quite hot enough to do what I wanted. After some consideration I went out and bought a 220V Miller for about twice the cost. The 110V machine sits unused. The Miller gets used all the time, (it is bigger and welds BETTER than the Lincoln) which one was the better deal? I have "been there", buy a quality machine. IMO this is even MORE IMPORTANT for a beginner, because a beginner does not know enough to be able to tell that the machine is junk, no one can learn to weld that way. I AM saying that my experience with import welders = JUNK, I am also saying that the little LINCOLN welder is good for what it is made for, but the difference in quality between it and the MILLER is something a person can "feel"... my Miller just "feels better" when welding... does that make any sense at all....
Since you already weld stick it's my bet that you don't need any lectures on what a good weld is and that a good weld is laid down by the operator, not the machine. The wire feed will be a snap and is perfect for light work too, I use it for tacking motor mounts/crossmembers, etc. and in a pinch can do heavy work by chip/grind/notch and do multiple passes. For the people that equate 'quality' with higher priced welders, there's not a lot of substance to that in my opinion. My HF is a cheapo, but works as good as any other. Only spare parts I've had to buy are the copper tips, $5 for a half doz. And of course replacement cost of the entire machine is cheap too! he difference between flux-core wire feed and MIG is the absence of smoke and slag with the MIG. Of course that wont be an issue with you, DonMan, since you already know about that with your stick! As you already know that ain't going to affect the quality of the weld............. For body/sheet metal, that's all you need. I have one I got on sale at HF for about $80 seven years ago. I've ran dozens upon dozens of spools of wire through it, it's still working like it did when it was new.
No substitue for quality buy good equipment .The new push pull wire feeders look like tig welds and monkey can run one .Budget at least 2 thousand dollars on a machine and you will decrese your disapointment I tried it wasted money .Harbor frieght is ok for shit you are gonna throw away.just my 2 sense but its not spent on junk. Once you master a good wire machine the dust will grow on the old stick machine .Watch out on used ones most people that have a good machine dont sell them if you know the party selling the machine have them weld a scrap for you .Good welds are universal stick tig or mig check penetration on back side. people who say a mig wont weld good enough proably have small one !!P.S. I have a 110 volt lincon used mostly on sheet metal with gas 3/16 no problem and a 210 miller for the big stuff the new sa 200 millers tigs lots of features good machines
Mig welding technique is related to caulking a bathtub For a machine I would upgrade to having a gas solenoid using solid wire instead of that fluxcore-tubular wire only
The question was asked about, air cooled/scratch-start TIG torches. Yes, these do work, and are easy to setup on an DC stick machine(you do have to be able to change polarity of the leads). They do require argon gas, and being air/gas cooled, it will use more gas. The cost of argon is a definate consideration when choosing between air/gas cooled and water-cooled. If you want to be able to weld aluminum too you'll need an AC/DC machine, and a hi frequency box. This can all be purchased in a package, or assembled from add-ons/upgrades. Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith could have not put it better myself <!-- / message -->
Hello Don, You mentioned that your son has shown an interest in welding. As a capable welder although not as skilled as some, I would say you hit it correct when you said educate. In today's world people who work with their hands can make an excellent living as a "certified" welder. I am referring to your sons interest as well as yours. Most areas have community trade schools that offer evening classes as well as full time programs. At this time I am working a project that will need 18 welders starting in September and lasting the rest of this year. The demand for welders is intense and we are scrambling to bring in guys and also ladies from around the country. This is proving difficult because the need is high in most areas and welders are able to choose where they work. Just saying it is a valuable skill. Welding equipment is like any other tool buy the best you can afford. MickeyC.
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