what size welder ???????????

For that kind of money you are probably talking about an Arc welder?

At it's higher settings it will weld LR chassis thickness OK, but it won't be the welder (machine) that makes the top notch welds, it will be the welder (person!)

MIG is easier to pick up if you're starting from scratch (hah!) and you're less likely to blow large holes in your chassis.

SIP make a nice machine, the Migmate Pro 170 which is well up to welding chassis and other structural bits and can be turned down nice and low. Not particularly cheap (about £300) but it can produce nice welds with little effort. Unfortunately mine refused to work on lower settings and when I sent it back for repair they;

1) chopped of the 13A plug that was on it 2) Stole a nearly new 5Kg roll of wire 3) Stole 5Kg wire adapter pieces 4) Didn't fix it

So not a very good show from SIP's repair depot. However it works beautifully on LR bits and I mostly use higher settings and run fast anyway :)

An arc welder will work. Just expect to practice a lot - 130A maximum is the lower end of the welders you want to be looking at. And the lower the better at the other end if you want it for running on thin steel like the footwells for example.

Hope that makes sense! I've had good service from Weld UK's website - phoned to confirm something that was uncertain (no they didn't supply the SIP machine) so I'd be happy to recommend them as a potential supplier.

Regards

William MacLeod

On or around 22 Sep 2003 21:48:17 GMT, Andy enlightened us thusly:

go for a mig something in the 150-170A max. region (or more, if you can afford it). Don't try and learn manual metal arc (aka "stick") welding on yer chassis, it's not easy at all. mig will weld upside down (though not so tidily unless you practice quite a bit) and all sorts of stuff, and is much easier to learn.

get various scrap metal and practice on it - ideally, rusty thin scrap metal :-)

learn how the settings work and how to handle it, and how to make strong welds (doesn't matter if they're pretty, so long as they're strong, although often an ugly weld is a weak one.)

then weld up the chassis.

then start on tricky stuff like bulkheads.

all the above (except choice of machine) assumes that you're not already a suitably-experienced welder.

You can have the front wings off my Golf, then!

-- David

I tend to agree with William , buy a MIG , vertical welds with an arc welder take "some time" to get right , in comparison MIG welding is like drawing on paper with a big thick felt pen (ie easy to get good results) I have a SIP 130 its pretty crap but works OK . I have a arc welder too I've used it about once since I got my first MIG. Steve the grease

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On or around Tue, 23 Sep 2003 23:52:49 +0100, "R L Driver" enlightened us thusly:

I still use the stick, but only for heavy stuff. That's partly 'cos the adjuster is rusted solid at full output, mind...

but use the mig for all the vehicular stuff.

one point to note: the small disposable CO2 bottles are a load of crap.

lashed you the necessary on a regulator and rental for the smallest size of commerical bottle I could easily get (PT10, about 2 cu.m) of Coogar 5 (CO2/argon mix, I think) and not only does it overall work out cheaper, I reckon (rental ain't much) but produces better welds using less power. don't really see why the latter, but it does. same setting as before exhibits characteristics of the welder being turned up too high, for any given metal thickness.

Austin Shackles wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

I bought the 140 amp SIP mig and initially had real problems. Turned out the wire feed was screwed up. (a) Some bright spark had put the reel on with one of those sticky labels on the inside. That caused drag! (b) The first few metres of wire were kinked so did not feed anyway.

So, if you have problems, check the wire feed. Even now I have to make sure the tube to the hand grip is as straight as possible or I get wire feed problems. SIP are crap. But for the price, what do you expect? Mine did the job. The old Pug 504 sold to the first man who saw it!

Derry

I use a fairly cheap 'Clarke' mig - I had problems too with the wire feed. On the clarke one it will take 2 guages of wire (6 & 8 I think) by reversing the feed capstan roller (different size grooves) it had been built with the '8' groove set but '6' wire came with it! swapped it over and have had no problems since.

Dave

On or around Wed, 24 Sep 2003 12:23:02 +0100, Dave Wheatley enlightened us thusly:

Mine's a Clarke 150 turbo, in the end I attacked the wire feed, and got it much more reliable. As you say, the capstan on the thing has 2 grooves, one for 0.8 and one for 0.6 But the roller above it was, on mine, misaligned so that it tended to slip off the top of the wire. eventually, after swearing about it a lot, I got around to taking the plastic arm off and filing it down a bit so as to get the said roller to line up correctly, and now it's OK.

again, you gets what you pays for: this (and the cheapo SiP) are about the cheapest on the market for the current rating. Clarke do "professional" welders (and so do SiP I expect) but you're talking about more money, normally. Though I see in their book that the bottom of the "pro" range is very near the top of the "DIY" range. I'm sure there used to be more difference in price, it may be that they've done a low-rating "pro" one to bridge the gap.

I had a clarke 130 stolen, cw a pt10 coogar bottle, have borrowed a

130 sip and a 110 cebora. The cebora was the only decent feed system and had a useable length of lead, the low current meant the shield had to be very close to the work. Coogar is the best gas but at GBP 190 to pay for the bottle I'm not up for that again. Similar with the BOC bottles, and cylinder handling fees on top of the gas and monthly account puts me off. The last one I borrowed had a CO2 bottle from Messer, 10kg IIRC of CO2 and GBP14 for the refill, no other costs 'cept I don't know what the original purchase was. My fire extinguisher service man with refill a 5kg extinguisher for GBP10, so that might be a worthwhile route.

If you are going to weld upside down make sure the mask covers your ears or get a proper hood, I could blow bubbles out of my ear for a while :-(. Also if into extensive fabrication have gloves that cover all the arm and a leather tunic that does not leave your throat exposed, the spatter may only tingle for a while but the sunburn is sore for days.

The mig I took a fancy to did 185 amps off a yellow (16amp) socket but took two men to lift. Nine foot of euro connected lead, and gas or fluxed wire. The flux cored wire seemed worthwhile as a reserve as 5kg (actual steel) reel cost GBP34, about the same as 10kg CO2 and 5kg of ordinary wire, I never have worked out gas:wire cost ratios, don't do enough to worry about it.

On or around Wed, 24 Sep 2003 21:36:36 +0100, Andrew Heggie enlightened us thusly:

ain't that a pub gas bottle? some people use them, but it relies on a good relationship with your local pub...

Try Air Products for gas cylinders.

I have a BOC Argoshield bottle, and only pay about 30 - 40ukp a *year* for the rental. Has their deal changed?

Beth

Nope - I use BOC and they seem just fine!

Richard

Phew, good. I spent more on those silly little bottles of gas you can buy in the likes of Halfords than before I found I could rent a bottle off BOC. And it doesn't run out unexpectedly. In fact 3 years later it's still got 1000psi left in it. Must get round to doing some more welding. :-)

Beth

This illustrates my point about flux cored wire, I've never seen any let alone used it so cannot comment on its efficacy. You have used about half your bottle, what size is it? This has cost you ~GBP110, what would the same amount of welding cost using fluxed wire?

AJH

It looks just like the pub bottles but has "weldpool" writ upon it. It is a bona fide welding gas bottle and marked not for refilling other than by Messer.

As I said I reckon it is near as cheap to buy a re tested CO2 extinguisher with the threaded tap (extra GBP10.99) and have that refilled.

Got two thanks. I keep mine leased for ~GBP300 for five years, I cannot afford to be without oxy-acetylene for cutting, bending and brazing on site. I can manage most welding repairs with this or the stick welder but prefer mig for speed on bodywork and fabrication, generally in a workshop.

After Beth's comments I'll investigate BOC again but when I changed from them they were more expensive and less local for me. The Air products pt10 bottles were also more sensibly sized than the portapacs or the full sized stuff.

As I said for irregular use it's the rental/lease charges that hurt, once you start burning gas it's the cylinder handling charge.

AJH

I've tried it once, on a borrowed welder, and didn't like it, but having said that, if one were welding in the middle of a field in a howling gale.........

Richard

Dunno. I've never used it. I dont even know whether you can get flux cored aluminium or stainless wire either.... The gas mig complements the arc set very nicely. Is gasless as easy to use as a gas mig?

Beth

So far, I've only used cored wire with my Migmate DP, and TBH the results are as good as anyone could reasonably expect, taking into account my total welding experience is less than 20 hours!

~GBP110,

I have, to date, used only flux cored Mig welding, but AFAIK you can't get it for aluminium or stainless. I've been told you get better results with "traditional" Mig welding than with gasless, and one of those days I'll try it and see. I chose gasless because I thought it'd be easier to use outdoors, but a bit of wind still makes a difference.

-- David