Technical The finer points of MiG welding machines.

Wasn't it nice in the old days when the guy behind the counter actually knew his products or understood car lingo ?

Now the guys behind the counter know no more than what the computer screen tells them, no matter the product or the area of sales....

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Yes, it’s sadly where we are today.
I remember when it was slightly odd to run into someone who was oblivious, and most people were quite knowledgeable about their products. Perhaps I’m misremembering this or have a different perspective now, or was just blessed to be able to find those people.

On this particular subject of welding machines, one guy was telling me all about one of the multi process machines. I already told him my inventory of welding equipment and the ONE space I needed to fill. Hr said it was capable of being a tig welder, so I asked him this multi thousand dollar machine had AC and had High frequency - his response was it runs on 60 hertz 220.
When I told him any cracker box welder putting out DC was also capable of scratch start DC tig he informed me I was incorrect, he informed me that straight CO2 couldn’t be used for MiG welding.

back in the late mid 80s one of them sams club Costco type stores ( it was called something else) had 110 MiG welders. That stupid thing was great for sheet Metal. It was really cheap though. And you could not get parts. The entire gun whip was just chinsy, the regulator and gas hose was a joke, impossible to get parts/consumables for it. It was almost a laughable toy but it would do sheet metal body work great. In 1996 I bought the one I currently have now and sold the old one at a garage sale.

I know one thing for sure, I damn sure miss the business end of the yellow pages.

 

I cant really help on the inverter technology, mine is an old transformer type Millermatic 200 that I paid what was to me a lot of money back in the early 90's. I'm following along because Im interested in what you come up with. Good Luck.