Ryan ...You talked about using your neighbors Bobcat and how much you liked the way it welds.Ryan wrote:Hello all. I am trying to make a tough decision on a welder. I just got my shop built and am starting to outfit it with some new equipment. I currently have a lincoln wire matic 250. It's just an okay machine. It has some random stuttering issue that I've given up trying to troubleshoot. I am not a big fan of mig welding. I like it when I have alot of fab bing and tacking. I've been using an ac 225 buzz box for the last two years and I use it when I need a real man's weld. However, I despise the thing. Everytime I use my neighbor's miller bobcat I fall into a dream state. Oh how I long for a sweet arc.
So, my problem. I can't decide what I really want. I could happily replace both welders but I am trying to minimize my purchasing. I will have a cnc plasma table coming soon. I really really want to learn tig and have to learn to weld aluminum. However I have never used a tig machine. I've been researching this process for years and have watched most of Jody's videos on tig welding. It looks tough. Not sure if I want to get into something else with a steep learning curve just yet. But boy I would love to have a machine with a sweet arc for stick welding.
As for price range I'm thinking somewhere around $1600 for the machine. I'm not worried about budgeting the bottle and consumables. I have had my eye on that Everlast 250ex for a while. Seems like it has all I could want. But I started looking at the mts 251 and the mig 275p. I see that guys are doing some sweet aluminum welding with their spool guns with pulse. I didn't know thin aluminum with a spool gun was possible. And it looks faster which I like. The 275 also has the option for a push pull gun which is pretty cool. I've also been looking at the used market. I found an insane deal on a lincoln square wave 275 with cooler for $1500 and a syncrowave 250 with pulse for the same price. I am second in line to look at them. The only issue is power consumption. I will be running a hypertherm powermax 65 or 85 on my cnc table. Of course right out the chute I won't be running the welder wide open while the plasma is going. But all of you know there comes a time. It's just so hard to walk away from these beautiful pigs. Though I surely don't want to buy an indy car to go grocery shopping. I want to get some opinions on used and new equipment. I do lean towards inverter based machines but I love old school reliability. I drive a ford idi diesel lol
And also what should I do about aluminum. Nobody in my county does aluminum or even tig welding. In fact, there is only one welder and he is never working. I'm already doing some fabricating out of a gravel floor "shed". The community seems to have alot of interest in what I have been doing on the side.
Another thing I consider is breakdown. I am a former owner op truck driver so this is important too. If I get an Everlast and it craps under warranty it will be gone for 3 months. This being a business I will either have to lean on my current machines or buy another. Buying another isn't completely out of the question if I love it and it makes me money. If I buy a used red or blue machine, I can choose a few different local places to take it to. But it will cost me money too.
Here is a breakdown of what I'm considering. Please add or subtract as you see fit.
Everlast 250ex: What's to say?
Everlast mts 251si: multi process, pulse feature, spool gun for aluminum, 40% Duty Cycle at 250 tig/200 stick, 120/240v
Everlast 275p: synergistic and pulse features, spool or push-pull gun, 50% Duty Cycle at 275a mig/200a stick
Miller syncrowave 250 needs no introduction
Lincoln square wave 275 probably gone already otherwise out of my price range I think
Miller multimatic 200: I just think these are cool. Not quite a shop machine but I can hook it up to the gen and weld anywhere
Dinosaurs: miller dialarc hf, miller a/bp, hobart tigwave 250, heliarc 306 fully loaded (been watching this one), miller 330st aircrafter, miller syncrowave 300 (too big?), lincoln idealarc 300/300 tig hf, miller dx250 multiprocess (what's this worth with only 20hrs?)
I will only have 200a amp single phase service. I may be stuck with an inverter machine. Don't know
Anybody else's head spinning?
let me give you another something to think about. Most of my life Ive been using engine drive welders..big ones, little ones and in between ones. I started out on an old Lincoln pipeliner SA200 that was built in the late 50s..the motor eventually blew after 4 years of steady stick welding with 3/32 to 1/4 inch 7018 rods rebuilding everything from dragline buckets to mufflers for heavy equipment. I bought the thing for 50 bucks and rebuilt the motor and ran it 3 more years at home and in the mines. I ran some big Miller and Lincoln diesels as well and a few Bobcats, Trailblazers, and Lincoln Rangers. These days I am using a Trailblazer 350 Pro that the guy I am contracted to owns, or my own Miller 502D, that I am in the process of building a rig for when I get time.
Now Ive also used some of these new inverter type things on construction, and I can honestly say I wasn't very impressed with any of them...just didn't seem very smooth as compared to an engine drive type machine, and ive stick welded and ran flux core with them...and wasn't thrilled with them at all.
If you watch the paper, and find some equipment sale flyers and such you can pick up a decent engine drive for about 1500 bucks, that's for maybe a trailblazer or ranger, the bigger ones might be 2 or 3 grand for an older machine, 5 or 6 for a newer one depending how big you wanna go and your desire for power...build a trailer and you got portability and you can do tig, stick, flux core and anything else you want to do, if it don't have CV capability you can still run most flux core wires on CC, and some wires seem to run better on CC, don't know why but Ive done it a lot.
If you've got some mechanical ability they aren't that hard to work on if the need arises.
Just thought I would give you another idea.