Total Welding Noob Needs Help From TW

So I'd like to start welding. Specifically stick welding. I've watched a few safety video's on Youtube and I think I can begin welding with a healthy dose of respect for the danger involved.

My question: Since most outlets in my house are 120 volt and I don't feel like unplugging a dryer, whats the most practical, affordable, and fairly reliable welder that I should get to start stick welding?

I understand buy-once-cry-once, so if spending another 100-200 will be worth please let me know.

Thanks!!!

 

ESAB Fabricator 141i - 110 Volt Mig/Tig/Stick

Best price around plus free shipping. I looked extensively for 110 welders and this is the best value and the most versatile. There will be Miller and Lincoln and Hobart options too but Esb is the best value (all are good machines). Esab is the largest welding supply company in the world.

https://www.weldersupply.com/P/849/TwecoFabricator141iFREES

 

Much appreciated!

 

You might check around for a weekend welding class. In Spokane, WA they are around $50-60 for a home welder class. Usually on Saturdays. Teaches you safety and techniques. Both good things

 

Why stick? Are you looking at just welding interesting metals or specific situations?

There are pro welders here and hopefully they will respond, but I have welded a metric crapton of "dirty" pipe and flat stock with flux mig. I have plenty of experience with stick but if I am going to drag a box out to a remote location it might as well be a mig or a readywelder. The new hot stuff is a multiprocess machine which gives you MIG, stick(flux and gas), and even a TIG( limited), and they are light as hell(40lbs).

 

I just heard that stick is the best way to start out. Plus it seems pretty simple. Everything you need is right there in the stick. I heard you can learn some pretty bad habits with MIG if you don't know what you're doing. (Again, this is just from the limited sources that I have.)

 

Stick/SMAW is for mostly thick material. Structural heavy ass stuff, not what you would use to build your truck. All the companies that do suspension, roll cages, bumpers, etc use TIG and\or MIG.

That ESAB machine is a good learning machine to mess around with, but you are very limited to what you can weld on household 120v. I suggest running a 220v circuit just for your welder.

Another Stick vs MIG is stick is way hotter has lots of spatter so I recommend a welding jacket and stick welding gloves, no sneakers. MIG if you are setup correctly won't have as much if any spatter. At work when I weld stick I have steel toe boots, weld jacket, welding gloves, n still manage to burn the **** out of myself. At home I MIG in shorts, shirt, vans, n light weight leather gloves.

There are lots of guys on here I'm sure will chime in with more

 

Your r

Your right, stick is the best way to start welding. When you get good at stick (especially 6010) it makes MIG cakewalk.

 

Check out weldingtricksandtips.com
That guy is legit and a master welder in mig tig stick. You can learn a ton off his website

 

Whats the advantage of running the full 240v plug instead of the standard 120? If stick burns the hottest and there are 120v options why would TIG/MIG need more than that? What does all the increased power translate to?

 

Double the voltage, half the amps. Machine will be able to run higher amps and tax the power source less.

Our machines run on 220 Volt and draw about 28 amps. If it were 110 Volt, it would be 56 amps which you aren't going to be able to do. Most walls are wired 110 Volt 15 amp, and occasionally 20 amp. A smaller hobby machine if offered in 110 Volt will be designed to draw up to 15 amps and you have to plug it direct into the wall, not on any extension cord. We had a smaller machine that was portable for quick jobs here and there that was 110/220 Volt. At 110 Volt it would weld up to 5/16" thick plate steel, 220 Volt would weld up to 3/8" thick plate steel.

If it were me, don't start learning on Stick, start learning on Flux Core. You will get more useful practices with it if you plan to move in to MIG welding in the future. Stick is typically for structural, heavy wall or thick plate. Flux Core is like MIG, less the gas and it uses a different type of wire. Harbor Freight has a new line of welders and for a hobby machine, you can't beat the price.

 

Thanks Joe!

 

Another vote for flux. I wanted to get into welding but I wasn’t sure if I would like it. I spent $150 on a flux machine, gloves from Amazon and auto darkening helmet from harbor freight. I really enjoy it, so eventually I’ll buy myself nicer gear.

 

What mobtown said. That and every time I've asked around guys say to buy a machine that can handle more then what you plan to use. Its better to have more then not enough. Also the duty cycle is usually bigger on a bigger machine

 

I second this. Stick isn't the easiest to pick up but it makes you learn the fundamentals of managing a puddle among other things. After you can stick weld MIG is almost point and shoot

 

Another thing mentioned is that stick gives you the option to weld thicker materials. Given the same input a $200 craigslist Lincoln tombstone can weld thicker steel that my much more expensive Millermatic. That said I prefer to use the Millermatic

 

My eventual goal is to make a hidden rear winch bumper that goes under my rear license plate. Stick is for structural, would flux be good enough for fabing up a winch mount?

 

I do stick, mig and tig plus ac tig (aluminum). All of them have their strengths. At work we do a lot of dirty out of position stuff. To do this mig you need to have a crazy long whip or crane in a mig machine. Not very practical. Stick you can have crazy long leads and pull it to wherever you need to be. Tig wouldn’t work in our repair environment.

Now mig is a great option for bench welding and in shop fabrication. Same goes for tig. Mig is the idiot proof machine. Multiple starts and stops or having your setting way off you can stop before burn through. I personally hate flux core as I feel in most cases it is used by those on the cheap who either can’t afford setting up for gas or don’t know any better. Once they switch to gas I rarely see anyone switch back. I have used flux outside on thin material but that was because I ran out of smaller stick rods.

With any type of welding you need to watch the puddle. As an old German trained aerospace / aeronautical welder once told me “the puddle will tell you everything you need to know if you listen and understand what it is telling you”. Most people look forward when welding and not at the back of the puddle. Looking back will tell you if your travel speed or heat is off or the angle of your torch / stick.

Practice makes perfect. I hated stick due to a shitty machine and a lack of experience. Now I stick weld in my sleep. I rarely touch mig anymore but that is due to circumstances more than anything. If I am at home I am doing tig and work I am usually doing stick.

Now the OP’s question regarding 120 vs 240V machines. 120 sucks. Anything but the thinnest materials and you run out of amperage too fast. If you only do thin sheet metal then maybe it will work for you. Anything quality is 240V. Once you drop to 120 even on a multi voltage machine you lose 1/2 of your amperage and tend to max your machine out constantly. If you are intending to do 1/4” I think that is beyond many 120v machines or at best it is tapped out. So I would t even bother with 120V machines. That is my opinion so take it for what it is worth.

 

Your opinion is greatly appreciated!

 

I think this should be weldingtipsandtricks.com

The listed url is dead.