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afternoon, It's got to that point where I'm doing more welding than is convenient to quickly have a go on a friend's, or to blast something together with the old arc welder in the garage.. So I've been eying up MIGs, because they are what I'm used to, what everyone recommends for car stuff, and I can pick up a decent secondhand one for a couple hundred quid without too much hassle. ButEbay seems to show that the price of DC Tig welders is going down to the point that I'm wandering whether to go for one instead. Obviously I can't do ally because it's DC only, but I always enjoyed tig more than mig when I was learning at college because it was all nice and soothing and pleasant.. So what can one do that the other can't? Are lower end tigs utter pap? Running costs significantly different? Will I miss the ability to point and shoot to tack two pieces of tat together? Your thoughts would be most appreciated  |
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...proper medallion man chest wig motoring. |
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tig's all well and good on nice clean steel in a nice enviroment, in a jig or bench etc, but not much use welding up patches or big jobs.
I use both, couldn't do my job with just one type. but for home use you need to have a mig really.
oh, and i'l take a decent secondhand one for a couple of hundred if theres any going?
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Last Edit: May 1, 2010 17:42:12 GMT by Al Ramone
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B-8-D
Posted a lot
down to one car!!
Posts: 4,038
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my advice would be if you are making stuff on the bench mainly then a tig is nice but for rusty curse word and stuff in akward positions and on the car get a mig...
in fact if you cant have both a mig is always more usefull....
si
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Cheers guys. Thought that may be the case, but had to ask.. oh, and i'l take a decent secondhand one for a couple of hundred if theres any going? When I say decent, I mean 'higher end amateur'. You have to remember I spend my weekdays in an office and just enjoy a fiddle with cars with my time off. I've had 'hobby' migs before, and they've always been terrible but there's no way I could justify spending into the thousands to make a few brackets and make holes disappear at MOT time. I appreciate that if you're working with welders all day every day then your definition of 'decent' will vary from mine a fair bit |
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...proper medallion man chest wig motoring. |
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my advice would be if you are making stuff on the bench mainly then a tig is nice but for rusty curse word and stuff in akward positions and on the car get a mig... in fact if you cant have both a mig is always more usefull.... si X2, you cant beat the flexibilty of MIG for pointing into a tight corner and welding away, also much easier for tacking panels on a car. |
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No engine too large,no car too small,,,,,
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don't forget gas costs either. I do Mig welding with straight CO2 gas, once you have a cylinder and regulator the refil costs me £18 on an exchange basis. To do TIG welding you need to use Argon gas, which costs much more and you tend to have to pay a cylinder rental, so its costing you even if you don't use it.
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Mig or tig?Deleted
@Deleted
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A good hobby mig will be more flexible than a tig in my opinion. My 150TE has been faultless and I've been using and abusing it for over 8 years now.
Tig is fine if you want perfect smooth stainless and ally welds but mig is great for blatting stuff together and you've got the option to go gasless if you're welding in a windy environment. I don't have any pics of my gasless welding but you probably wouldn't be able to tell it apart from my gassed mig work. It's not very good on bodywork but works just fine on other stuff.
I use disposable bottles on mine. Don't know what other people are doing but I don't seem to get through anywhere near as much gas as others do either.
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you can get an ac/dc tig for 400 delivered from the evilbay, i bought one, and its a cracking little machine.
i was told 200 amps wouldnt be enough to weld half inch thick ally, yet i had to turn the machine down as i was melting the setup pieces !
tig is good for control and nice neat welds, but on a car mig is the weapon of choice
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I use disposable bottles on mine. Don't know what other people are doing but I don't seem to get through anywhere near as much gas as others do either. A lot of my mates turn the gas right up when they weld, I'm tight, i only turn it on a little bit and see if its enough.  |
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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Cheers guys It looks like it will just be a case of keeping an eye out for a MIG with the right cost/quality compromise instead of buying the first pile of pap that shows up like I did last time.. |
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...proper medallion man chest wig motoring. |
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nutter81
Part of things
I joined facebook so i could talk to the missus
Posts: 928
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ben you have seen my mig at area 52 the skip mig it works faultlessly now its set up and it cost me £0 its a clarke 100e
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Yeah, nought pounds was a bargain ;D
Problem is that I have been utterly spoilt by Bruce's Portamig and fancy something a little bigger. Nothing massive, but want to be able to both do a bit of bodywork and blast nice thick stuff.
I was discussing with Remmoc (at the Bristol Classic Car show) today about welders and I will be paying attention to the Clarke range. They seem to be pretty well regarded as decent amateur use machines
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...proper medallion man chest wig motoring. |
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I use a SIP 130T and with 0.8mm wire it can weld up to about 3/8" steel easily....
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I use a SIP 130T and with 0.8mm wire it can weld up to about 3/8" steel easily.... no it can't....  |
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Mines a 140amp and i had to have it on max to weld 4mm plate, did the job but it wasn't pretty.
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Volvo back as my main squeeze, more boost and some interior goodies on the way.
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i had a sealey powermig 200, the most it could weld was 10mm, so i doubt a little 130 amp jobbie could weld 3/8
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Mig or tig?Deleted
@Deleted
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Clarke 150TE with the blue metal case here. I wouldn't get a red/black cased one (which is the replacement model) until I knew the insides were identical. You can still get the blue one though.
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I had a sealey powermig 200, the most it could weld was 10mm, so I doubt a little 130 amp jobbie could weld 3/8 Agreed - my welder is rated at 215A and it handles 10mm fine, but certainly couldn't see how 130A could weld .5mm less? I think Ben is coming around to the idea of saving up for a Portamig judging by the text & phonecall earlier. Good man ;D Do it Ben, you really won't regret it  |
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i still prefer tig  |
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I still prefer tig
Some say he's the evil twin brother of the MIG
All we know is.....he's called the TIG";D |
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