Welding Helmet what’s the best VALUE for your buck?

Looked up welding Helmet and only found two posts with that… anyway I’ll just ask question probably again. I’m looking for the best “value” for the dollar auto darkening welding helmet. Harbor Freight comes to mind but is that the best Value? I don’t remember how fast they shift to dark but the more expensive do it faster??? I wanna keep my eyesight intact so safety is important. Just want the fastest darkening, most reliable and durable helmet I can get without paying trillions. Thanks!

 

The real Question is for a Hobby type Hood or for a more serious application. Wearing it hours every day a good head gear is really important.

If your really on a tight budget why not a fixed shade hood?

People tend to never change the outer cover plates and then the sensors being able to detect the arc flash degrades and the hood is garbage .

Wearing the correct safety glasses will help with Arc flash besides it is the other people that get you the same ones shooting grinder sparks at you.

Hoods like grinders are a very personal thing I know myself it took me at least working my way through 10 hoods.

We all have our favorites. Ask 10 different people very easy to get10 different answers

There are so many reviews online how many have you read.

 

I bought a hood from yes welder and am super happy with it

 

I’m a hobbyist at the moment but will retire fairly soon and will do more then. Mostly concerned about how fast it goes black. Don’t want something so weak that the plastic parts start busting off. We’ve all seen that with the products put out these days. I’ve read some but they are generally forums with opinions or are biased selling their product. I had an old pull over hood but would like to upgrade! I trust the folks on Tacoma World why? Because we come from various backgrounds not just diehard I own this only folks. We own our Toyota’s because they are reliable and we must all be looking for that or wouldn’t own one. So I figure this is the best place short of consumer reports to ask this question. Let me know what ya got, how well it is working for you, why did ya buy it and for the safety concerned how fast does it go dark! Thanks for the heads up on what makes them go bad by the way I’m interested in that also.

 

My mistake was buying a Harbor Freight shield. Next thing i know I'm in the hospital with flash burns. 2nd most painful thing I've ever felt.

 

i use this one for my hobbyist/tinkering needs. had some issues this past fall with the battery going bad and slow switching in the cold, but a new battery fixed the issue.

i found the eastwood version that's slightly cheaper later on, i would've gotten that one if i knew better, i'm starting to lean more towards eastwood stuff just because it seems a little nicer quality for a similar price to the harbor freight stuff.
https://www.eastwood.com/eastwood-large-view-auto-darkening-welding-helmet-l6700.html

 

I work for the DOE, with guys that do very high end welding on ultra high vacuum chambers & the like. The government will buy them any helmet they want... not one of them uses an auto darkening model. Dunno why.

 

Hobbyist or professional, doesn’t matter. You have one set of eyes. Harbor freight does not care if you are permanently crippled, and good luck getting restitution from a nameless Chinese company. If you’re going to weld, protect your eyes like you would protect your most valuable possession, because they are.
I use a 3m speedglas; it’s a long running line, very reputable, and easy to work in in.

 

Hobbyist here.

Just get yourself the tried and true Lincoln 3350.

When it comes to safety, there's no reason to go cheap.

My main hood is a 3350, and my back-up is a 1740.

 

Easy answer to that.

They are doing the same type of joints in the same positions pretty much all the time.

The same output range no need to change filter plates every hour or have several fixed shade hoods which I did before Auto hoods.

Most likely very little Fabrication Work.

The Auto Hoods really Shine on Prefab work nodding your head hundreds of times a day gets old.

Go from running .023 hard wire to Air Arcing at 400 amps with a simple adjustment rather then changing a filter lens or hood. Within an hours time.

 

Over the years I have used so many different products most times it was because needing to get my head in tight places I have used the all leather flexible hood .

A pair of burning googles with a #10 filter lens.

Some jobs you needed to also have your hood attached to your hard hat. So your hard hat needed the slots for the adapters.

Many Different Fixed shade Hoods By far the plastic head gear parts cause the most problems they get brittle with age . No matter what hood always have at least one spare head gear and extra parts. I have 3 Hoods the same style. Left over from my working days.

Always with good safety glasses Never had but one arc flash problem did the Raw Potato slices.

Having Brown eyes was a big help more protection then Blue eyes.

 

Great info.

In short, let the job dictate the hood type.

OP is a hobbyist so I don't expect him doing 6G on pipe, but still..right hood right job.

For instance, Miller has plenty of nice offerings but some would fail to realize that some of those hoods don't offer protection for overhead. Nothing against Miller, as other quality name brand hoods have offerings where the shell itself is made of a different material than another.

The 3350 does protect from slag/etc in the event that you get hit from it while doing overhead. I can't recall if the 1740 does (you can sell the shell is different, lighter too) but it's only a back up for light welding anyway.

 

I have several female friends that are welders for a living that do not know each other!!

They all say the same thing Welding hoods are just like Bras they all do the same job but each style is different .

You can go through a few different ones to you find the one that is best for you.

They strange out of position welding hobby welders do in most cases is being in a position where 3 of the 4 sensors are blocked and the 4th one is dirty . That causes a failure to darken

Unless their has been a major advancement in the technology by one auto dark hood manufacture the time to darken are all pretty standard .

Research and design is more expensive then reverse engineering enough said .

I have been really out of the loop the last 30 months.

 

Those Lincolns are nice helmets, they look a shit load better in regards to graphics than Miller LOL

I think I will pick up a 1740 when my 15 year old Swiss Sellstrom finally dies. But I have been kind of drawn to the ESAB Sentinel A60.

 

I was using the 1740 at one of my jobs; no overhead at all just flat and 2G for the most part doing MIG and TIG on mild and stainless.

What I loved about it is how much lighter it is compared to the 3350, though the headgear isn't as nice.

 

Was killing time the other day at Atwood’s… saw theses but didn’t see their price marked anywhere. They didn’t have the price labeling correct. Was reading previous posts and wanted to show darkening speed of these that I saw. Not sure how much difference it makes to your eye health but there is a difference and the faster it is the more expensive it probably is. So on the more expensive ones mentioned before how fast do they darken compared to these cheap ones?
They are 1/25,000 th and 1/30,000 th

Where is best place to buy a helmet from that has lots to choose from. Only two helmets were represented at Atwood’s on their shelves.

 

Local welding store here has multiple, of all brand types.

Though I got mine online.

 

If your getting into welding it always pays to find a welding distributor that will work with you.

Some can be complete twat waffles don`t want to be bothered with hobby type customers.

Every branch can be so very different .

As long as your hood is down every type I used your eyes are protected ! Even if the hood does not go dark.

The out of position welding I get into this happens often the sensors do not see enough arc to trip.

it is 100% my fault no fault of the hood.

No idea about the low end hoods

If your eyes are that sensitive that turning a light on in a dark room causes you pain maybe rethink the welding.

Do you have Blue eyes??They are much more sensitive to arc flash.

At 66 after 40 plus years of welding my eyes are fine. The eye Doctor says my vision is focused close up from the welding. I need glasses only while driving.

If i was buying my first auto dark hood. #1 the weight #2 The comfort of the head gear .#3 The ease of changing cover plates.#4 type of batteries.#5 Low Arc performance . The speed would not even be a factor

Good Luck

 

For what it is worth I left my hood out in the Truck The batteries were dead.

I never gave it a thought tried to start welding a few times Thinking the hood would start working .

Must have been at least 5 or 10 flashes the hood failed to go dark. Not a problem to my 60 year old eyes then or today.

 

You see, this is why I don’t weld. Then I’d be deaf, dumb and blind