Page 2 of 2 FirstFirst 12
Results 11 to 18 of 18

Thread: 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

  1. #11
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Southeast Iowa
    Posts
    893

    Re: THANKS! 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

    [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] Wire IS a little easier, as long as the machine has an internal contactor. This business of having the wire live all the time is the pits, and takes away the advantage of setting the wire where you wqnt it and then pulling the trigger. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img] I think that first-time welders who learn with wire may have to get themselves used to "sewing" the seam together with lots and lots of rod motion. The deposit rate is so small on some of those machines.....especially with inner shield wire... that you have to be conscious of how much you need to "linger" and build up some deposit. [img]/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img]
    CJDave

  2. #12
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    SouthCentral Oklahoma
    Posts
    5,236

    Re: THANKS! 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

    Dave, You have been unreasonably prejudiced against little portable MIG units run on 120VAC. Your experience with the CHEAPO unit soured you.

    I have a Lincoln Weld Pak 100 (old obsolete model but equivalent is available) that has served me well for about 15 years. It has a gas control solenoid valve but I have never used shielding gas with it, just inner shield (flux cored) wire.

    It is great for welding less than 1/4 inch steel and will do 1/4 inch steel too but slowly and perhaps with multiple passes and while doing it you may have ample opportunity for a break to think, get a beverage, or just cool your heels as it will shut itself off rather than burn up. I have often exceeded its duty cycle and gone into thermal overload/shutdown. I have abused the heck out of this unit for 15 years and the only maint has been to change contact tips and the plastic thingy around the tip.

    One of the few nits is that you have to unbolt (with a tool) the connections and reverse the wires to change the polarity. So... I don't do that (yeah, I'm that lazy!) In theory I could weld aluminum or stainless with it but haven't. It is way more portable than my AC/DC Lincoln tombstone/buzz box.

    I sometimes use it for tacking a structure together that I stick weld. IT is super for that. It will run on a small generator for portable welding and you don't need a few thousand pounds of welding trailer. I find it to be convenient, effective, and a little frustrating when wishing for a little more umph and duty cycle welding long beads.

    When I built storm shutters for the guest room in the basement (super safe room) I only used the little Lincoln MIG for welding. I made the piano hinges out of 3/4 inch black iron pipe with a close fitting round bar for hinge pins. One side of the hinges was 3/16 angle and the other side 3/16 sheet steel (the shutters.) Heat distortion can easily make the hinges into a resistance trainer (been there and done that with stick welder on previous effort) but the hinges on this project work just fine.

    I'm not religiously fanatical regarding the little Lincoln MIG and if I had it to do over again based on my experience, I'd get the 220-240 VAC unit to get more duty cycle and reduce the need for multiple passes. If you get a more powerful unit you will run into the same exact problems but just a few gauges of steel heavier until you finally end up with a BIG HD PRO UNIT which is expensive as well as not easy (totally impossible) to pickup in one hand and walk away with.

    I recently set up a small welding trailer using equipment I had and a few purchases. The trailer deck is 4x8 ft. Amidships I mounted a 17,500 Watt gas driven genset. I then mounted my Lincoln tombstone, plasma cutter, little MIG, and an air compressor with horizontal tank (just under 4 ft long.) I have hold down clamps for standard portable oxygen and acetylene bottles. This gives me enough power to run the compressor and plasma at the same time and if anyone is working with me there is enough capacity to support a grinder or the MIG at the same time as the compressor and plasma. During a recent power outage I used it to support our residence since the automatic standby generator wiring wasn't finished.

    Suggestion to OP...

    Get a 220 MIG unit from a major manufacturer NOT Chicago Electric (cheapo Chinese Harbor Freight unit) Get a Lincoln, Miller, or Hobart (did I leave out anyone?) Lowe's has decent prices on Lincoln but shop around. Then keep alert for a used stick machine on the order of the Lincoln tombstone/buzzbox in AC/DC. The stick is very low tech and hard to hurt and less risk to buy used. The portable MIG units are way higher tech and if you aren't some kind of super lucky guy or really knowledgeable about MIG units, buy a new one.

    Pat

    "I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"

  3. #13
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
    Location
    Tombstone, AZ
    Posts
    599

    Re: THANKS! 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

    Wow Pat I am envious of your welding trailer.

    Here is mine I made just for use around the place.


  4. #14
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    SouthCentral Oklahoma
    Posts
    5,236

    Re: THANKS! 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

    Jim, It is the same basic idea, I just spent more $ and have a little more stuff on mine. Mine doesn't have a wagon style tongue on it so when you pick up the tongue fairly high the CG shifts rearward and you rapidly lose tongue weight, nearly balancing the load so on fairly level cement (garage or shop floor or garage apron) one guy can move it around pretty good. Of course the odd wood scrap, larger than standard piece of gravel, or an overweight gnat in the way and you need help.

    I thought mine small enough to get into most places I need to get but you definitely got me beat. Backing the short coupled single axle thing is challenging but doable if you stay alert to small changes which tend to grow quickly.

    Pat
    "I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"

  5. #15
    Junior Member
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
    Location
    Ashland, Ohio
    Posts
    9

    Re: 220/120 AMP Service for Welder?

    I have a Lincoln Electric 120V model SP-135 plus, which will run MIG or flux-core. I've used it to modify a boat trailer and build a sailboat cradle, both with a max steel thickness of about 1/4". I've also used it to weld stainless and do some other smaller mild steel projects and repairs. I've never had it time out, and I couldn't be happier with it. I bought a 120V model because of the convenience and portability. IIRC, it was about $500-$600 new.

    Tod

  6. #16
    I have an ESAB 120V mig machine that I've used for over 10 years. It requires a 20-amp circuit, and uses almost all of it with heavier gauge wire and higher settings, but is ideal for thinner metal, and for tacking subassemblies together prior to stick welding. I tried it with flux-cored wire, but that was as messy as stick welding, and I gave up on it. Gas is the way to go.

    I use a Lincoln stick welder, and it's on a 220-volt 60-amp circuit, so I can crank it and apply some heat.

    I also have a small Harbor Freight inverter stick welder that works surprisingly well up to about 1/4 inch material. I think I paid $99 for it, and it's been worth every penny. It'll run on a 15-amp circuit, and even a short extension cord, so it's perfect for small jobs and tacking outdoors. It's based on an inverter circuit, so it's very lightweight, and has an over-current feature for starting that seems to work very well.

  7. #17
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Southeast Iowa
    Posts
    893

    Cool 220/120 Service for welder

    Yeek!... I just spent almost a full week in the shop making friends with my Miller 35 wire machine, and once again it is abundantly clear to me that bigger IS better. The duty cycle of that machine must be somewhere out in space because I have never had it trip off. I have to say that when it comes to wire vs stick, he who runs wire has to be much more aware of factors like "deposit" and "penetration" because on thick material the wire doesn't automatically get in there and blast it's way to the bottom of the "vee" like stick does; you have to move-move-move, around and round; as in that old old rock and roll song.
    CJDave

  8. #18
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Southeast Iowa
    Posts
    893

    Smile The right welder

    I suppose in the final analysis, the right welder is the one that meets the needs of the owner; be it building up tracks on a Cat hour after hour with harfacing rod, or welding sheet steel on a do it yerself project. It's hard to beat a highly portable machine if the power supply can deliver the needed current. The combination of a gen set and a small welder is hard to beat for those jobs that can't make it to the shop.
    CJDave

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •