For those of us that do our own repairs and fabrication, what welders and machines are you running in your shop? What about plasma machines, or oxyfuel set ups?

I run a Lincoln 140 MIG (110 volt) and an Everlast 200st SMAW/GTAW. The set up gets me by. I use the mig for small fab stuff, nothing over 1/4'' thick. I use my everlast to practice on pipe coupons for work and school. Also use it with some 3/32 or 1/8 7018 electrodes for the thick stuff I gotta weld, but I really don't like the everlast. The mig is grossly under powered, like 10% duty cycle at mac amperage.

I'm looking into the Miller 211 that just does mig. Or the Lincoln 210MP that does mig, and DC Stick and Tig for the same price.

Discuss, post pics of your machines and shop if ya want!

 

I have a Miller suitcase welder. Stick and tig.

110 or 220 volt, integrated tig, but I use my regular tig rig when I tig.

My friend has a Lincoln mig I use for thin stuff usually.

 

I try to kill it with a 1987 trail blazer 250g and some 6011s from that time period , and when I need to cut I just crank her up to max and get out the cut off rods

 

Miller XMT-304 with a few feeders and the HF-251-D pretty much handles all the needs but AC Tig for Aluminum

Which I hate for the time involved in the prep work

If I really need to do Tig Aluminum I just bring something home from work.

 

Yeah, I'm not a fan of tig aluminum, not very good at it either. Maybe I should get better. A lot of friends lately have been asking me to fix some stuff for them, small bass boats, bicycle frames etc. We have tons of xmt's at school, along with lincolns 350 something I think. Not bad machines, cc/cv does everything we need. Run em parallel to CAC. Too expensive for me though!

 

I built mine kinda one piece at at a time from scrapped units till I got all the needed parts .

I bought the Miller Trail Blazer 302D new at $50.00 over the distributor cost.

One of the perks of being single!!

 

I have a Miller 251 mig and a Miller econo tig....,

 

Lincoln 175, good starter/novice setup.

 

Hobart 190 set up with a bottle of c25 and oxy/acetylene for cutting. I'm on the hunt for a used Lincoln buzz box for stick duty.

 

Miller 211 with fluxcore, I still need to invest into some gas, but have been very lazy too do so.

 

Lincoln 175 & Chemtron 300 Tig

The Tig is a giant 1970's era beast with a 90% duty cycle at 300 amps

 

300 amp Lincoln
it used to be grey till I painted er red like the modern ones are

 

I have one of the older millermatic 211 mig welders with 75/25 sheilding gas.

 

So sense this is a welder thread I figured I would ask for some opinions. I'm looking to get a Hobart Handler 140 mig/flux core welder. You guys think that would be sufficient to do my SAS? Also does anyone have or use the HH140? If so what do you think about it?

 

To answer your question I would recommend that welder to the hobby type welder.

I would only use .023 wire . That is what we tell our customers

20 amp circuit no long extension cords

It can do the job if your skills can handle the job.

Read through the owners manual before pulling the trigger

 

Thanks! I wanted to start with a reputable company since this will be my first welder. This project will be my first major welding project and after that I would like to continue to build on my skill set, so I didn't want to go out and and drop a grand on a Miller since I'm not a professional and don't need that level of welder nor would I use it enough to justify the expense. I really do appreciate the info.

 

1985 Miller Thunderbolt 225 AC/DC stick welder.