Welder

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The old oil-cooled welders will be going for at least £80 for a completely knackered one. You'd have to be seriously lucky to get one for £40, or even luckier like me, whose next door neighbour gave me an oxford bantam 180 in return for fitting the tow-bar to his discovery :) The buzz-box transformer welders are ok. Just make sure to get good rods, otherwise you could end up pretty frustrated, and not bothering to continue. Also make sure you understand that you won't be doing anything thinner than 2mm, preferably 3mm with any stick welder. If you get good with a buzz-box, you'll be awesome with a good welder ;)
 
Agree with DREVIL (I much prefer that name ;)), the lidl ones aren't great at all. I bought one a wee while back and its definitely not fantastic, though I'm just using it for learning but I can see that its pretty ****
 
tombardier said:
The old oil-cooled welders will be going for at least £80 for a completely knackered one. You'd have to be seriously lucky to get one for £40, or even luckier like me, whose next door neighbour gave me an oxford bantam 180 in return for fitting the tow-bar to his discovery :) The buzz-box transformer welders are ok. Just make sure to get good rods, otherwise you could end up pretty frustrated, and not bothering to continue. Also make sure you understand that you won't be doing anything thinner than 2mm, preferably 3mm with any stick welder. If you get good with a buzz-box, you'll be awesome with a good welder ;)
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Thats bull ;)


I paid £40 for an Astonarc (same as the old Lincoln ones, made in sheffield) good welder, lays down a nice bead, was welding some 5,5mm with 3.2 6013's the other day and had lovely penetration on 110A (180A max 20A min)
 
the_wolf said:
Agree with DREVIL (I much prefer that name ;)), the lidl ones aren't great at all. I bought one a wee while back and its definitely not fantastic, though I'm just using it for learning but I can see that its pretty ****
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I've welded with an Aldi welder, and it was OK. The duty cycle on thick rods was a a bit crap, and that's where they fall over as they get hot, but the electrics are so simple that you should be able to do some decent welding with one, no matter how cheap it is. Cheap rods are another matter - now they can really cause your welding to go to ****!!
 
Dr_evil said:
Thats bull ;)


I paid £40 for an Astonarc (same as the old Lincoln ones, made in sheffield) good welder, lays down a nice bead, was welding some 5,5mm with 3.2 6013's the other day and had lovely penetration on 110A (180A max 20A min)
Click to expand...

As I said, you have to be lucky. When you see welders like that on ebay, they go for market value, which is going to be more than £40 (and here's where you tell me that it was on ebay LOL)
 
tombardier said:
I've welded with an Aldi welder, and it was OK. The duty cycle on thick rods was a a bit crap, and that's where they fall over as they get hot, but the electrics are so simple that you should be able to do some decent welding with one, no matter how cheap it is. Cheap rods are another matter - now they can really cause your welding to go to ****!!
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I've been using SIFtrodes at £14 a box, they're not top of the range like the ESAB OK or Murex etc but I didn't want to pay £40 a box :eek:
 
I just buy white box ones from my local tool shop, which are relatively cheap, but not crap! :)

My wife just loves the fact that they live in the airing cupboard too hehe
 
For simple, DIY Arc welding, the electrodes you use are more important than the welder. I have 2 Arc welders. A SIP 140 which I use most of the time, and a little Clarke Easi Arc 110, which I use when welding away from home. The SIP 140 has fully variable power from 40-140 amps and the Clarke has a high/low switch that welds at either 50 or 110 amps. I can get good results from either, but the SIP has by far the better duty cycle, although it is very bulky & heavy compared to the Clarke. If you do buy a cheap welder, make sure you buy good quality electrodes. A cheap welder using good quality rods can produce a better weld than an expensive welder using cheap rods. When I first started I used Clarke elctrodes. These are crap, it can be hard to strike an arc on low power, and they produce an awful lot of very hard slag. I now use Oerlikon electrodes and have found these to be much better. They work really well on both welders, and using 1.6mm rods on the SIP I can weld 1.3mm mild steel.
 
martin1512 said:
For simple, DIY Arc welding, the electrodes you use are more important than the welder. I have 2 Arc welders. A SIP 140 which I use most of the time, and a little Clarke Easi Arc 110, which I use when welding away from home. The SIP 140 has fully variable power from 40-140 amps and the Clarke has a high/low switch that welds at either 50 or 110 amps. I can get good results from either, but the SIP has by far the better duty cycle, although it is very bulky & heavy compared to the Clarke. If you do buy a cheap welder, make sure you buy good quality electrodes. A cheap welder using good quality rods can produce a better weld than an expensive welder using cheap rods. When I first started I used Clarke elctrodes. These are crap, it can be hard to strike an arc on low power, and they produce an awful lot of very hard slag. I now use Oerlikon electrodes and have found these to be much better. They work really well on both welders, and using 1.6mm rods on the SIP I can weld 1.3mm mild steel.
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keeping your welding rod dry is the key to success , these are very handy for storing welding rod and very cheap

Welding Rod Keeper
 
Thor1950 said:
6013 is a shallow penetrating rod for sheet metal
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Yeah I saw that on Millers site, was still leaving a good mark on the other side of the sheet though, gonna pick up some other rods this week to mess with.

Thinking some 6011's as I'm running AC only, will use the 6013's for non structural bits, I'd return the box but no doubt I'll find a use at some point
 
People use 6013 for all sorts - it's general purpose, and you can still get good penetration - more than you'll get with the kind of MIG available to mere mortals!
 
Dr_evil said:
Yeah I saw that on Millers site, was still leaving a good mark on the other side of the sheet though, gonna pick up some other rods this week to mess with.

Thinking some 6011's as I'm running AC only, will use the 6013's for non structural bits, I'd return the box but no doubt I'll find a use at some point
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What are you welding?

Miller and Lincoln make 7018 for ac/dc use and works great. If you are doing flat work, where you can turn your parts into flat position go to 7024, it is a flat only rod
 
tombardier said:
People use 6013 for all sorts - it's general purpose, and you can still get good penetration - more than you'll get with the kind of MIG available to mere mortals!
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I have access to a 400A mig during term times ;)

Have use of the 180A stick welder at home and the 475A TIG too, can only use about 250A at home but I can borrow the three phase output down the road at the local garage and ramp it right up to 475A :eek:
 
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