MIG gas upgrades.

dieseldog69 · Nov 25, 2018

Right then, just ran out of gas on my MIG, very not impressed as I have hardly done any real welding in comparison to the welding I've done on MHMs TuffTee so did a little investigating.

Seems that my problem is the valve block in the MIG gun itself, gas goes in the back and the pipe goes all the way up to the gun where there is a big brass valve block with a trigger operated button to open up the gas supply, seems this is a bad idea as the gas seems prone to leaking at my gun

Question is, has anyone put an electric solenoid in their hobby welder to control the gas from inside the welder?

Now off back outside to see how long a 600g hobby bottle lasts me LOLZ

#MIGwelding #shieldinggas #HobbyMig

Disco1BFG · Nov 25, 2018

dieseldog69 said:
Question is, has anyone put an electric solenoid in their hobby welder to control the gas from inside the welder?

I persuaded a pal of mine to upgrade his "hobby" type MIG to a EURO torch and an internal solenoid for similar reasons - in his case, the torch switch worked a contactor which duplicated the original torch switch, and also energised the gas solenoid ... IIRC the gas solenoid was about £30 off the bay... can't remember how much the torch was... but guessing £70 ish, with connector...

IMHO, only do it if the wirefeed gubbins is up to the job - IME, this is the weak link in most low cost MIG's

top drive · Nov 25, 2018

Is it a Clarke ?

Mines came from factory assembled wrong.

Dismantled the torch and replumbed it right get through alot less gas Now

Kwakerman · Nov 25, 2018

dieseldog69 said:
Right then, just ran out of gas on my MIG, very not impressed as I have hardly done any real welding in comparison to the welding I've done on MHMs TuffTee so did a little investigating.

Seems that my problem is the valve block in the MIG gun itself, gas goes in the back and the pipe goes all the way up to the gun where there is a big brass valve block with a trigger operated button to open up the gas supply, seems this is a bad idea as the gas seems prone to leaking at my gun

Question is, has anyone put an electric solenoid in their hobby welder to control the gas from inside the welder?

Now off back outside to see how long a 600g hobby bottle lasts me LOLZ

#MIGwelding #shieldinggas #HobbyMig

Yes and I Eurotorched it at the same time (and fitted a decent earth connection), cant remember where I got the valve from. The most fiddly bit of the conversion was getting the euro connector to line up with the wire feed due to the angle of the front panel. Ended up making different length spacers to go between the socket and panel to angle it correctly. I fitted a proper gas input connection on the back of it as I didn't like the original. Gas valve is above the feed mechanism.

Ratae · Nov 25, 2018

I have the Clarke 151EN gas/no gas.
Converted it to Eurotorch a while ago using this ebay kit: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MIG-EURO...AS-SOLENOID-/113382356645?hash=item1a661d76a5 which comes with a gas solenoid. The instructions were very good.
Should have done it a LONG time ago. No idea whether it would still work with no-gas flux cored wire & TBH don't care - a bit of creativity with cardboard provides a good windshield.
Changed the regulator to a proper one & use it with Argoshield bottle from BOC as I claim it back through my business & it's MUCH better than CO2.

ETA. Looks like the gas solenoids are available on their own on ebay & hopefully would include another good 'how to'. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GAS-SOLE...cc174ff4a:m:mFvCnGlWP6a-FDg6pqGfUXg:rk:4:pf:0

dieseldog69 · Nov 25, 2018

Disco1BFG said:
I persuaded a pal of mine to upgrade his "hobby" type MIG to a EURO torch and an internal solenoid for similar reasons - in his case, the torch switch worked a contactor which duplicated the original torch switch, and also energised the gas solenoid ... IIRC the gas solenoid was about £30 off the bay... can't remember how much the torch was... but guessing £70 ish, with connector...

IMHO, only do it if the wirefeed gubbins is up to the job - IME, this is the weak link in most low cost MIG's

Had this one a while and it is the bomb, love it to bits and would get the wire feed rebuilt before I even thought about buying a replacement.

top drive said:
Is it a Clarke ?

Mines came from factory assembled wrong.

Dismantled the torch and replumbed it right get through alot less gas Now

No, not a clarke, a Euro branded generic machine, it's been with me for a good few years now and has gone through several torch liners and dozens of tips and shrouds, it's not that it's feeding the gas wrong but that the block is leaking by the seems of it and I would rather update the gas feed to an on demand supply over the current one

Kwakerman said:
Yes and I Eurotorched it at the same time (and fitted a decent earth connection), cant remember where I got the valve from. The most fiddly bit of the conversion was getting the euro connector to line up with the wire feed due to the angle of the front panel. Ended up making different length spacers to go between the socket and panel to angle it correctly. I fitted a proper gas input connection on the back of it as I didn't like the original. Gas valve is above the feed mechanism.View attachment 163365 View attachment 163364 View attachment 163363 View attachment 163361 View attachment 163362

Thats brilliant, I have already updated my earth to a decent clamp but the next step there is to fit the DIN connector I have and make the earth lead longer with an uprated cable as I did with my stick welder a few months ago.

I will certainly look at the eurotorch option.

Ratae said:
I have the Clarke 151EN gas/no gas.
Converted it to Eurotorch a while ago using this ebay kit: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MIG-EURO...AS-SOLENOID-/113382356645?hash=item1a661d76a5 which comes with a gas solenoid. The instructions were very good.
Should have done it a LONG time ago. No idea whether it would still work with no-gas flux cored wire & TBH don't care - a bit of creativity with cardboard provides a good windshield.
Changed the regulator to a proper one & use it with Argoshield bottle from BOC as I claim it back through my business & it's MUCH better than CO2.

ETA. Looks like the gas solenoids are available on their own on ebay & hopefully would include another good 'how to'. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GAS-SOLE...cc174ff4a:m:mFvCnGlWP6a-FDg6pqGfUXg:rk:4:pf:0

Cheers for that

Cool links

Disco1BFG · Nov 25, 2018

dieseldog69 said:
Had this one a while and it is the bomb, love it to bits and would get the wire feed rebuilt before I even thought about buying a replacement.

Cool.

We've two MIG's here, one very old clarke, and one much newer Thermadyne, both on (euro) Parweld torches - cheap consumables, and good availability too, IME.... Highly recommended.

dieseldog69 said:
a Euro branded generic machine

You knowz the rulez....

Hippo · Nov 25, 2018

Have a look at hobby gas as a cheap supply. This chap converts his rig to use it

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YmeP5uHtl4

Kwakerman · Nov 25, 2018

Hippo said:
Have a look at hobby gas as a cheap supply. This chap converts his rig to use it

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YmeP5uHtl4

Yep, that's what I use too

resto_d1 · Nov 25, 2018

Ratae said:
I have the Clarke 151EN gas/no gas.
Converted it to Eurotorch a while ago using this ebay kit: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MIG-EURO...AS-SOLENOID-/113382356645?hash=item1a661d76a5 which comes with a gas solenoid. The instructions were very good.
Should have done it a LONG time ago. No idea whether it would still work with no-gas flux cored wire & TBH don't care - a bit of creativity with cardboard provides a good windshield.
Changed the regulator to a proper one & use it with Argoshield bottle from BOC as I claim it back through my business & it's MUCH better than CO2.

ETA. Looks like the gas solenoids are available on their own on ebay & hopefully would include another good 'how to'. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GAS-SOLE...cc174ff4a:m:mFvCnGlWP6a-FDg6pqGfUXg:rk:4:pf:0

I've the same welder as you. No modifications to wire feed etc needed just plug n play fitment?

Disco1BFG · Nov 25, 2018

Hippo said:
Have a look at hobby gas as a cheap supply.

Kwakerman said:
Yep, that's what I use too

We were with BOC for a while, but got fed up with their "thanks for coming" charge - each time you pick a bottle up, you had to pay EXTRA for the "privilege"

- then air products, whose delivery charges got a bit silly

... then hobby weld, who were fine, but a few issues with their bottles, so we went to Energas ....

My point is shop around, and get the best deal for YOU, NOT for them ....

Also look at the different bottle capacities they do too - we're now runnning on the 300 Bar excel top bottles, which do cost a bit more to rent, but the gas is cheaper per unit volume..

Ratae · Nov 26, 2018

resto_d1 said:
I've the same welder as you. No modifications to wire feed etc needed just plug n play fitment?

No. The torches are very different. You need to remove the old one & make some modifications to the welder's front casing to fit the eurotorch socket.
Comes with very good instructions from the ebay link I posted earlier & isn't difficult. The torch lead is much longer than the Clarke & the feed is much better.
I don't know with the changes if it will still work in no-gas mode but I hadn't used that for years anyway.

Kwakerman posted some pics earlier & this link shows a 160 being modified so it will give you an idea of what's involved. The 151 casing front is flat, so you don't need to make up another metal plate to go on the front as he had to with the sloping front of the 160.
https://www.mig-welding.co.uk/forum/threads/converting-clarke-160t-to-euro-connector.14323/

resto_d1 · Nov 26, 2018

Awesome thank you. I only use gas. I'll look into this

Dippypud · Nov 26, 2018

Disco1BFG said:
We were with BOC for a while, but got fed up with their "thanks for coming" charge - each time you pick a bottle up, you had to pay EXTRA for the "privilege" - then air products, whose delivery charges got a bit silly ... then hobby weld, who were fine, but a few issues with their bottles, so we went to Energas ....

My point is shop around, and get the best deal for YOU, NOT for them .... Also look at the different bottle capacities they do too - we're now runnning on the 300 Bar excel top bottles, which do cost a bit more to rent, but the gas is cheaper per unit volume..

We use Adams Gas, they're good value ...

https://www.adamsgas.co.uk/

Kwakerman · Nov 26, 2018

Ratae said:
Kwakerman posted some pics earlier & this link shows a 160 being modified so it will give you an idea of what's involved. The 151 casing front is flat, so you don't need to make up another metal plate to go on the front as he had to with the sloping front of the 160.
https://www.mig-welding.co.uk/forum/threads/converting-clarke-160t-to-euro-connector.14323/

The front panel is flat but it is fitted at a slight angle to the case. When you get the euro connector brass wire feed tube correctly aligned with the feed rollers the mounting face of the connector wants to be vertical but the front panel is at something like 5 or 10 degree slope hence my need to shim the connector.

meego · Nov 26, 2018

I never walk away from welding without closing the bottle valve...tight. Even between welds sometimes I close the bottle valve. Too expensive now to let it leak away.

owas · Nov 26, 2018

I'm sure i have a spare mb15 here if you do convert to a eurotorch

owas · Nov 26, 2018

Yep, 3 meter.
Just pay the postage

Disco1BFG · Nov 26, 2018

meego said:
I never walk away from welding without closing the bottle valve...tight. Even between welds sometimes I close the bottle valve. Too expensive now to let it leak away.

Absolutely. One of the reasons we went to the Excel top bottles was the bottle "valve" is actually an over center lever - which you only have to touch to close the supply .....

I wonder if one of the gas suppliers would like to do a forum "deal" ? .......

resto_d1 · Nov 26, 2018

meego said:
I never walk away from welding without closing the bottle valve...tight. Even between welds sometimes I close the bottle valve. Too expensive now to let it leak away.

I'm the same. I am OCD with checking it when I bring it back inside. It leaks pound coins otherwise!! I want to upgrade my regulator (perhaps harris) and go eurotorch. I think I'd need to buy the kit above though as would need instructions for installation. Will need gas solenoid also.

I have to buy more landy parts first though!

MIG gas upgrades.

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