Yet another TIG welder question

[datas_brother]

I know tig welder questions have been asked here before but they have all been frame specific. I'm in need of a welder to do general shop stuff. Mostly steel but I with occasional Al. It's not something I'll be using everyday it's very unlikely I'll be making a frame with it. I've been thinking about some of the ebay china made machines because they are in the price range I would consider. Specifically one of these:

WIG Inverter AC/DC TIG-200P Pulse HF Schweißgerät + MMA | eBay
KOMPLETTSET: STAHLWERK AC / DC WIG MMA 200 PULS INVERTER SCHWEIßGERÄT + Zubehör | eBay
NEU PROFI WIG-TIG MMA ALU SCHWEIßGERÄT HF INVERTER AC/DC PULS 200A FUßPEDAL 230V | eBay
STAHLWERK AC / DC WIG TIG MMA 200 S INVERTER SCHWEIßGERÄT auch ALUMINIUM/ KUPFER | eBay
Alu Metall Schweißgerät WSE 200 Amp WIG TIG AC DC Inverter HFZünd Schweissgerät | eBay

Has anyone here ever tried one of these? Are they "good enough" for someone who will not be using it daily (and is a beginner)? I've been looking out for a used known brand machine but there hasn't been one near here for the last month so basically it's one of these or none. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Amaro Bikes]

Hi Kevin

I have no personal experience with the chinese machines from ebay but I do know a very experienced welder (mostly aluminium) who did bought one of those some time ago to replace his old big machine dead after 20 years of welding. His conclusions were the machine itself was pretty good but torch was too heavy and crap so he changed the torch and happy enough.

But if you want my personal opinion is that even if they do work fine, you could have some issues on future view, as any possible failure could be a great issue for bits/parts or customer service support.

If you do not want to spend too much money and can't find an used one for good price, I would recommend you to have a look at some eu based companies like r-tech welding from uk. They do use the same chinese machine as base, but they do upgrade it aftewards improving some possible weak points and most importantly they do have quite a good reputation on customer service and tech support.
I had a look to them when I bought my machine, although I finally decided to go for something a bit "better" and spent the money on a new oerlikon, but the r-tech ones had a serious chance.

Cheers.

[Mike Mcdermid]

Kevin your from the land of EWM and Lorch (my persoanl favourite)?

AC / DC PULS ALUMINIUM WELDING MACHINE 315 TIG WIG MMA WELDER INVERTER AC/DC | eBay ,this facscinates me as the video seems to show it actually working

As Aimar says above most of the import machines need some bits and bobs swapping to make them reliable
Rtech do this and a company called tec arc here in the UK it puts the price up though

seriously i have seen one of these cheap china welders sat in a box after 20 minutes where the guy just went and spent more money to get satisfaction and hes a hobby guy

its one of those you pays your money you takes your chances things im afraid

[datas_brother]

First off, thanks for the detailed info. It sounds like the units are ok but there could be a problem with service and the torch is a bit heavy. The second one in my list above offers 5 years guaranty and is located about 2 hours from my house. I will likely go with them. Besides, I could buy 2 - 3 of these machines for the price of a Lorch or Rehm.

I checked the HP of Welbach. They have a shop and offer it in EUR for the same price as the ebay add in GBP. In other words it's 230 GBP less to buy direct.

If I remember correctly, the pulser is only needed when welding thin walled stuff and only if you don't use the foot pedal (which I will buy as well). Is that correct?

[Alistair]

If I remember correctly, the pulser is only needed when welding thin walled stuff and only if you don't use the foot pedal (which I will buy as well). Is that correct?

Assuming I'm understanding your question properly, the answer is no. If you're welding tubing of a gauge typical in a bicycle frame, you will need the foot pedal, whether you're pulsing or not.

Alistair.

[Amaro Bikes]

If I remember correctly, the pulser is only needed when welding thin walled stuff and only if you don't use the foot pedal (which I will buy as well). Is that correct?

Well, it all depends, as usual...

Pulser can be helpful with thin tubes as it can put less overall heat, also can help for better looking puddle, but it's all about what you're used to, many experienced welders can do it perfectly without pulse, and a non experienced one with pulse will still go through troubles. It's just another "tool" you can take advantadge of. I do like pulse but I've also welded without pulse, and controlling travel speed and amps you can have similar results.

For the foot pedal, it can work together with the pulse or without. I find the foot pedal control much more interesting than pulse, as it does not only allows you to control the arc amperage at each moment depending on what the puddle asks, but also will allow you to handle the torch as a pencil giving better control of it.

Pulse? good thing but not a must. Foot pedal? Absolutely high on the wish list.

Cheers

[datas_brother]

Thanks guys! If you weren't all so far away I'd drop by with a case of good German beer.

I'm going for both (pedal and pulse). I'll start with some thick walled steel and work my way to the more difficult stuff when I feel ready.

[datas_brother]

While looking through ebay I found a curious thing. It's a unit into which you plug the output of a DC stick or tig welder that changes the current into AC. It claims it is to allow a standard DC machine to weld Al. Has anybody ever seen one of these and worked with it? Here's a link:

Klimag AC Plus 300 Industrie Zusatzmodul für alle MMA oder WIG Maschinen AC/DC | eBay

This is a standard auction but the same seller offers it for direct sale for € 1200.00

[Mike Mcdermid]

While looking through ebay I found a curious thing. It's a unit into which you plug the output of a DC stick or tig welder that changes the current into AC. It claims it is to allow a standard DC machine to weld Al. Has anybody ever seen one of these and worked with it? Here's a link:

Klimag AC Plus 300 Industrie Zusatzmodul für alle MMA oder WIG Maschinen AC/DC | eBay

This is a standard auction but the same seller offers it for direct sale for € 1200.00

Kevin its an add on box they used to be quite common where you would have a big amp requirement 300+ (think shipwelding) or a DC MMA power and that you might do a bit of TIG but it wasn't the primary purpose of that machine, basically let you convert a stick welder to a tig machine with a valved torch

Inverters have now largely replaced transformer machines so they have fallen out of favour to some degree ,plus you can get all that in a single box for 1200 euro bear in mind however the limit of an inverter or transformer power source running on euro electric tops out at about 230 amps ish to get 300 amps out of any unit you are looking at 3phase equipment

[datas_brother]

Well, I bought a welder. It's a Chinese import but the importer is located 20 minutes from me, has a service technician on site an stocks replacement parts. I still need to pickup the foot-pedal but in all I landed at about 1k€ including a full 20l argon tank and mask.

I did some test welds and I'm happy with the performance but what I need now is instruction. Looking around the internet I haven't been able to find any kind of step by step. There are lots of youtube videos but they are all limited to single steps in the process. Nothing that tells me what to do first, how to set the machine up etc. What I have found has gotten me to the point that I can produce better beads than by stickwelding but it's all guess-work at the moment. Any suggestions where to look?

Thanks

[Mark Kelly]

Kevin

I assume there's a winery and / or brewery near you. The maintenance guys will have lots of experience tig welding 1.6mm wall 316 tubing. Find something you can trade for a bit of hands on instruction.

[claritycycler]

I did some test welds and I'm happy with the performance but what I need now is instruction. Looking around the internet I haven't been able to find any kind of step by step. There are lots of youtube videos but they are all limited to single steps in the process. Nothing that tells me what to do first, how to set the machine up etc. What I have found has gotten me to the point that I can produce better beads than by stickwelding but it's all guess-work at the moment. Any suggestions where to look?

Thanks

Try here, I think you'll find what your looking for in the tig vids:

Welding Tips and Tricks - TIG, MIG, Stick and a pantload of other info

Brian

[abbeyQ]

Tig machine on a budget, all arrows point to a used syncrowave end of story.

[Tristan]

but what I need now is instruction.

Try your local polytechnic / technical training institute - many will run evening classes on welding, machine shop etc.

[datas_brother]

Thanks for the tips (on and off forum). I'll be asking around at my local metal workers in hopes of getting instruction an practice material (scrap). The nearest CC or similar offering courses is an hours drive so that is out of the question. The www. listed above looks good and I've subscribed to the noob email series. I'll post some pictures for critique as soon as I have something worth the 1s and 0s.

[datas_brother]

If you were to ask me to guess what the first thing is a noob welder makes I would say "a mess" followed by a welding cart. Here's both:

[anon.]

Tig machine on a budget, all arrows point to a used syncrowave end of story.

If you have the space, the ability to move it into said space, a supply of power sufficient to make it work, no desire to ever move it from the space into which you initially placed it, and the luxury of waiting for one to come up for a reasonable price that you can get to before everyone else who's looking for the exact same machine and that comes with all the parts to make it go then definitely end of story.

[Amaro Bikes]

Thanks for the tips (on and off forum). I'll be asking around at my local metal workers in hopes of getting instruction an practice material (scrap). The nearest CC or similar offering courses is an hours drive so that is out of the question. The www. listed above looks good and I've subscribed to the noob email series. I'll post some pictures for critique as soon as I have something worth the 1s and 0s.

My two cents would be to get your hands first into "normal" tubes with around 1mm thickness, so you can focus on hand positioning and welding pot feeding (given you've already done quite some practice on simple flat cornered srufaces welding). And once you feel confortable and with some kind of "memorized" movement on the process then you can begin with thinner tubes (<0,8) where heat control and possible cheddar cheese holes issues might happen. Otherwise, if going straight on into cycling tubes (<0,8mm) you might have to deal with too many things at first and make learning curve a bit harder.

Also, it would not be bad idea to go first with "simple" welding arch, no pulse, so to better understand how heat/metal/feed works, and once it's all more or less understood you can begin playing with the pulse functions, specially when getting hands into real thin tubes where heat control is key

Anyway, tig welding does only have one main trick, wich is endless practice ;)

Cheers

[datas_brother]

Hi Aimar,

I don't see myself doing any bikes with this anytime soon. The first major project, which I've already begun will be a gantry style CNC mill. The Base of that is made of 60mm square pipe with a 4mm wall. The first welds I did with that was using 160 ADC, no pulse. The biggest issue I had was not dipping the electrode.

BTW how do I know how much argon is flowing using a pressure gage instead of a flow meter (see picture above)? Should I be able to hear a hissing sound during post flow like I do?

[Mark Kelly]

BTW how do I know how much argon is flowing using a pressure gage instead of a flow meter (see picture above)?

You don't, unless you are really handy with the Poiseuille flow equation. Get a flow meter, it should cost less than E20.