Welding

Get a multiprocess machine if you wanna do tig too that way you wont have to buy a mig later
mig and tig are both very useful desu, having both would put you on cloud 9 senpai.
Be aware that to weld aluminum you're gonna want a high frequency welder not just a tombstone deal,
2k could prob get you a nice used tig machine that can do aluminum, desu you need to do a lot of reading before you buy.

I also have a 50% discount on Snap on/Matco/Cornwell Welders

Miller XMT 304 CC DC Inverter welder?
denver.craigslist.org/tls/5698738500.html

I would like to learn about it, but I dont know where to start

From what I just read on google, you can't tig aluminum with that, so there's that.
I would pass on that unit.
I had to research a shitloat before I bought my mig, it's daunting at furst but you just gotta keep reading and reading until you understand what you're buying.
Knowing a welder would help you out a lot.

>listening to a furry

don't do this

For dem sexy welds you're looking at about $3k worth of machine and 3+ years of fucking around with scrap bits of metal.

For good enough welds (providing steel), you can get away with a $500 MIG and a couple days of practice

as im not in the states I can't really recommend any brands from there. I use a BOC AC/DC multi process pulse with high frequency start. It was like $1000 nz dollars from the BOC store.

Have a good read on weldingtipsandtricks.com/multiprocess-welder.html

That guy knows his shit like no one else, he also does lots of youtube stuff which is brilliant.

thank you very much

good luck on your quest.

Seconded

I'm guessing you're a kiwifag as well. How much should I pay for a gas mig welder if I'm just going to be mounting brackets or working on body panels?
Also should I lease or buy a bottle

get a BOC, about $500 - $700 for a good mig from them, use their weld guard anti spatter too, it cleans up with water.

Depending on use, an E size bottle should do for about 120ish leased and should last months with correct reg setting and daily use.

Not a kiwi, just live here, Irishfag.

Walk into a boc agent and talk money with them, they WILL cut the displayed price if you say its for trade.

A damn. There was a BOC on trademe that I was watching. Auction ended at $600, wasn't sure if it was worth

They are all I used at home and all I use here, honestly man, go to your local store, not an agent, pick one that suits and ask them for a team biznel torch upgrade or money off for cash.

Shit hot welders, and easy to use, lots of parts and support.

Watch youtube videos. Chucke2009 is pretty good. Get a welder and start welding. Or find another place that teaches it.

Welding is 90% practice.

fluxcore is fine when you can't lug a bottle around, you need to set the machine for gasless by reversing the polarity, and hold longer for a better pool.

Gas is more forgiving, fluxcore shows skill, just like arc.

If you can mig real good and can't arc good, you ain't a welder.

Fluxcore is fine if you're welding thick metal, try welding 18-22ga steel with fluxcore, fuck that shit.
I used to use a lincoln tombstone stick welder to weld together exhaust systems, that shit was horrible but I got pretty good at welding really thin metal with a stick welder.
of course that machine is made for thick ass metal, but you gotta use what you got when you're poor and 15.

I just cant get good at thin metal with a stick. Using 3/32s, didnt even know they made 1/16ths until just now. I only ever bought Linkon sticks, and they dont made 1/16. I may get some Hobart and try again.

It's possible but fuck me it's not easy, it's so fucking frustrating because it continually blows holes that you have to chase your tail filling in without making it even worse.
I swear the first time I welded with a true mig after years of stick and wirefeed I came in my pants and couldn't stop laughing, it was the most amazing thing ever to me, welds so clean and perfect, no holes blown, it just works.

tried it, it's not hard, it's hard to make a switch from mig to flux on sub 20 gauge, but I do 16 all the time with flux.

It literally is finding that feel point and having a decent fucking helmet so you can see what is going on.

So many "welders" have the shittest helmets ever and wonder what is going wrong.

The real trick is, being able to see that metal pool up, then being able to see where that pool is going.

3m Speedglas all the way. If you use a shit helmet, you won't get anywhere.

Well just the other day I needed to weld on a outdoor grill. Thin metal but not just that, it was also coated with, something. Not sure if it was paint or nitrite but it was to hard for sandpaper to remove and had really bad conductivity.

Tried to weld on it with tig but I was blowing holes. It was so unconductive, soon as I turned up the juice high enough to get an arc, it would just blow holes.

Finally got some scrap metal and layed it on top of the holes. Then got my stick out and tack welded the corners by stricking an arc on the scrap metal and letting the puddle slowly move down and merge with the sheet grill metal. Worked out pretty great in the end.

I fucking love stick welding though. Sucks for thin metal but just nothing else compares to it.

stick is cool, if you can do that with stick, you'll be real handy on a decent mig.

A bit of stick keeps the skills up.

>sneaky mig fill on a corner I missed though.

>furst
go away

Do you want to be a mechanic who can run horse shit welds or do you wanna do it right and learn how to weld? Take it from me, been welding for the last 6-7 years anyone who says it's easy in general is a hack or a mechanic. Learn GTAW.

You don't need a 220v for anything auto unless you are working on a 1 ton truck frame, even then you can just do a multi pass on it. I guarantee this guys welds are shit.

i like stick better than flux core mig

I just needed a 220 to put my shortened ford 8.8 back together and I needed 220 to also make my custom trailing arms with heim joints.
>welding anything other 3/16 with a 120v welder
Lmao 2bh

There's really no reason to not get a 220v welder though, the price difference between a decent 110v welder and a decent 220v welder isn't much when you consider that you're likely going to be using the machine for 20+ years in a home workshop setting. At some point over those 20+ years you're gonna weld something that will make you wish you had bought the 220v welder instead of the 110v.

I swear that guy is the biggest fucktard on this site, the only worst would be kitkat

>getting mad fur no reason

consider suicide

My little Hobart 140 does all I need it too. Has no problem with 1/4" thick shit.

Also has no problem using cheap flux core to weld up doors on my demo cars.

If you have to put a grinder to your welds to make them look decent. you are a grinder and not a welder.

;_;

What is this, opposite day? How bout you take your stanced shitbox and shove it up your ass.

Cool post user

if you use a welding machine, you're not welding, you're just operating a machine

Bought this as my first welder so I could cover all my bases. Can pretty much welding anything but aluminum with it. Can go 220 if the needs arises. Its a really great starter unit. Didnt want to get something I would grow out of and I see this always being relevant to me.

Faggot

Refer to

Make sure if you get a tig get a proper gas lens or youll be crying why your welds look shit

Is the welders make huge amounts of dosh meme real?

What's the catch?

this is mine, when i bought it.
paid $400 at a local auction. not many people bid on it. had to buy argon tank though

some do
and retinal damage

blind dogs?

Holy shit I tried a gas lens the other day with my new and improved skills and it's a huge difference. I've used a big champagne cup before that didn't really help because it's so bulky and needs a lot of gas, but a regular gas lens made my welds ten times better. I've been welding a lot of tool steel lately at work and it's tough to make it come out right. And I'm not a welder

Physical exhaustion. The welders that do make mad cash need to work 12 hour shifts in a muddy field in the middle of nowhere for the oil industry, and you've got an iron will if you still do that awful shit at age 35.

really? i knew an underwater welder who retired. in the 70's he was making 70 an hour (in the same industry)

I knew an underwater welder that died from an embolism. It's a tough trade

What do you guys think about arc welder, they are pretty cheap , I wanna do some work on car, modify exhaust etc. is this going to be ok or should I get something better?

they are fine but be sure to get an AC DC unit.
also any tig welder can do stick....

Not many people knew what it was. Hell of a buy.

could get one like this for about 200
they are SMOOTH machines

where I work the smallest welder is some tiny mig that runs on 240 volt and 10 amp
its ok for little things like tabs or sheet metal but it does not do well on any thickness required to support weight

the normal size ones have 500 volt and 32 amp sockets
and im farely sure the tig uses more power than the mig once running

one thing I think should not be overlooked is respiration of metal vapour
but most people I know do not bother with the masks for it and just wear the normal type of visor that only stops inferred

Did this a couple months back when i discovered the magic of proper gas lens

...

Are you aware that you're a cat?

Breathing in fumes from vaporized metals all day long isn't good for your lungs. Even with welding hood + lenses a lot of welders end up with ruined eyes eventually. High paid welders work really long hours in shitty conditions and usually live in trailer parks in the middle of nowhere for weeks and months at a time. Welders in most large factories are being replaced by robots. Underwater welding is extremely dangerous and high stress as there's no room for error. Welders in smaller, local fabrication shops make okay money but usually aren't getting rich...

You can make bank as a pipeline welder but you're pretty much gonna be working 12 hours a day, 6-7 days a week, and living in a trailer house with a bunch of other smelly, drug addicted, mentally unstable pipeliners.

Wire up a 220v Circuit with a good 4 conductor plug if you want it to last though.

Running at 220v it draws half the amps from the wall as the 110v and ramps up much more easily.

There are two kinds of welders who make good money.

Oil Field/Underwater/Specialist Welders, ie any kind of welding where a robot isn't practical... yet.... This literally sucks.

and the second are production machine welders, basically if you have enough experience as a welder you can get work as part of an inspection/process improvement team. You examine the welds the production machines make and adjust the materials and controls to improve quality/reduce costs. Depends on who you work for but it could be weeks of tedious boredom and documentation, punctuated with days and hours of panic as you struggle to figure out what supplier fucked in what way and ruined a production run...

Exactly like being a hooker, drugs become the escape that make the little downtime between work livable. But it just eats away at the large amounts of money that drew the people in to begin with. As with many things, people like to talk like they'd have the willpower it takes to overcome adversity, but that talk comes to end real quick when they're finally tested.

you furst

Ew mig cunt get a life

>looking at thing
>see welds
>look closer to inspect welds
>see mig dots
>my face

Cant really argue with its efficiency though.

>There's really no reason to not get a 220v welder though

what if you don't have a 220v hookup? my garage doesn't have one and I DOUBT my landlord would want one in there

lets go, timestamped, mig for mig.

> I DOUBT my landlord would want one in there

Sure are a lot of people that think the whole block is going to explode when you hook up to 220.

It wasnt that sort of insult. Its just something that happens when you mig. The implied insult is that mig is easy mode.

I'm the same fag that told him to get a tig, specifically a BOC pulse tig......

but i admit, mig is just boring and I made that sign because the tig'ed penis was less than impressive.

Ohh shit, I didnt even know it was a penis. Thought it was an Ayyy.

it was a penis. My mig response was adequate.

Unless I have guessed wrong, you seam to be rustled.

Again, I was not insulting you or your welding, I was insulting mig. Kinda like when you see a nice looking car and then you walk up to it and its an auto. Just a general observation I have made when I see welds. Its always disappointing to find out it was mig.

far from it chap.

I was merely asking you to show your mig, since it's so easy and anyone can do it.

I've seen hugely impressive mig, both using stainless wires, and standard mig wires.

generally a good welder will pick up a mig torch for ease of use on a material he understands. He will know that if a critical, good looking weld isn't necessary, he can pull a mig out instead of setting up a tig and prepping.

Kinda like when you roll up to a show and see a cage is chomoly and realize that a whole different set of welding skills is required.

Mig don't mean pulling a trigger and covering your eyes with your hand, you need to watch what the weld pool is doing to get a nice looking, effective weld.

Yes your blind, trigger finger weld might hold a tack, but it's far from actually being a weld worth a fuck.

>sorry, i'm drunk, and I weld lots.

Which is why I said you cant argue with its efficiency. But it will never take the skill of tig or stick and never get the results of either.

r8 my stick, then I need a hug.

>hold me

I don't like people.