Welder purchase advice

[Yellowtail]

11 minutes ago, SomchaiDIY said:

I was expecting this level answer even from reading posts with my poor english skill

I apologize, I should have made myself more clear.

 

What I said was that I believe most production welding of stainless steel in Thailand is MIG. That would be my experience. I never said or meant to imply that all production welding of stainless in Thailand was MIG, or that TIG welding was not used in production. 

 

You were absolutely correct when you said: "You cannot comment on weld method if you never see the product."  I cannot, but to be clear, I did not mean to imply that MIG was best for all products. 

 

Do you think the weld in your video was sound? I would bet there was not 20% pentation, probably less than 10%.

[Ralf001]

3 hours ago, Yellowtail said:

Again, for home shop you TIG is probably great, but you are not running production. 

 

Are you trying to run solid wire? We ran flux core wire with ArCO2 mix. 

Pure argon in  the TIG and 70/30 CO2 belnd for the MIG.

 

We have 75 TIG welding bays here at my work, all welding stainless.

 

 

 

 

[sometimewoodworker]

21 hours ago, farmerjo said:

I can only give actual results of voltage drop from my use.

And i was still getting a 30 volt drop at 105 amps with the inverter welder,i had my wife reading the AVR meter while i was welding.

Do you know the actual power consumption at 220V? Most/all welders show the power used at the voltage they are set to. 
If you are actually drawing 105A at 220V then

1) your welder is huge

2) your meter must probably be a 30/100

3) the PEA feed to the meter or your feed from the meter is undersized.

 

We are in the process of swapping 10mm tails from the PEA supply to 35mm ones as the current tails are undersized for our meter. Once those tails are swapped we will find out if the PEA supply is undersized as we currently are getting a similar percentage drop to you but the under/over limit switches cutout at about 185V

[sometimewoodworker]

8 hours ago, BritManToo said:

I ain't a perfectionist, If I'm welding brackets for solar panels (weight 20Kg), and can hang myself off the bracket (weight 75Kg), then I consider that a good weld.

That’s a perfectly good empirical test

[sometimewoodworker]

8 hours ago, BritManToo said:

Assuming the display on my welder is correct!

That display seems almost guaranteed to be incorrect! Though as a relative comparison it’s good enough and only really relevant if you try to compare the numbers you use to a different welder.

[Yellowtail]

1 hour ago, Ralf001 said:

Pure argon in  the TIG and 70/30 CO2 belnd for the MIG.

 

We have 75 TIG welding bays here at my work, all welding stainless.

 

What do you manufacture? 

[Ralf001]

17 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

What do you manufacture? 

Automotive accessories.

 

 

[Yellowtail]

2 minutes ago, Ralf001 said:

Automotive accessories.

 

 

Anything in particular? OEM, aftermarket or both?

 

We manufactured commercial and industrial HVAC products. Mostly  dampers, louvers and sound attenuators. Most of our stainless stuff was for tunnel and water treatment.

 

 

[Ralf001]

28 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

Anything in particular? OEM, aftermarket or both?

 

We manufactured commercial and industrial HVAC products. Mostly  dampers, louvers and sound attenuators. Most of our stainless stuff was for tunnel and water treatment.

 

 

OE and aftermarket.

 

 

[farmerjo]

14 hours ago, sometimewoodworker said:

Do you know the actual power consumption at 220V? Most/all welders show the power used at the voltage they are set to.

Will check next time it's out of the box.

I don't think there is anyway to tell on the welder.

Is there a test i can do to find out.(multimeter,clamp meter)

Manual is in Thai but the jist i get is it will draw 12,500 watts at 300 amps.

I run an AVR which will show lights but not numbers.

 

 

[sometimewoodworker]

A clamp meter round the 220v line cable is the simplest.

 

from the numbers it’s likely that it is indeed a beast of a machine, probably the welding voltage tops out at about 40v and the 220v maximum consumption is likely to be maxing out at about 50A. 
 

I’ll defer to @Crossy for a definitive answer but it is probably a poor idea to use it on an AVR. Of course I don’t know if the welder will have any problems with a low input voltage but your AVR is probably being heavily stressed.

 

normal advice is to bypass the AVR for high current devices like water heaters, probably welders also are in the same category.

[Crossy]

6 minutes ago, sometimewoodworker said:

normal advice is to bypass the AVR for high current devices like water heaters, probably welders also are in the same category.

 

I would certainly run any significant welder on a bypass, our little inverter beast runs just fine on the regulated outlets, but it has a 16A "Shuko" plug so one would assume <16A (I've never actually measured it).

 

@farmerjo on your welder there should be a rating plate showing it's maximum consumption from the 220V - just post a photo of the labels on the beast.

[farmerjo]

20 minutes ago, Crossy said:

 

I would certainly run any significant welder on a bypass, our little inverter beast runs just fine on the regulated outlets, but it has a 16A "Shuko" plug so one would assume <16A (I've never actually measured it).

 

@farmerjo on your welder there should be a rating plate showing it's maximum consumption from the 220V - just post a photo of the labels on the beast.

Hi Crossy,

I don't have the ability to bypass.

It is a 50kva AVR.

My electrical knowledge is not great but say i did bypass the AVR with my power supply then wouldn't the welder turn from a 300 amp machine to say a 50 amp one.

 

[Crossy]

11 minutes ago, farmerjo said:

Hi Crossy,

I don't have the ability to bypass.

It is a 50kva AVR.

My electrical knowledge is not great but say i did bypass the AVR with my power supply then wouldn't the welder turn from a 300 amp machine to say a 50 amp one.

 

That's definitely a beast!

 

49.3A @ 220V is about 10kVA so you should be well within the capabilities of your 50kVA AVR so no worries there.

 

You are going to need a special outlet or wire direct on its own 50A circuit on at least 6mm² preferably 10mm² cable.

 

How the welder behaves on low supply voltage depends. Is it an inverter type or a conventional transformer (very heavy). An inverter will try to compensate for the reduced input voltage and will probably do pretty well if you aren't running it at maximum welding current.

 

 

[sometimewoodworker]

1 hour ago, Crossy said:

49.3A @ 220V is about 10kVA

Isn’t it about 43.6A?
 

Not that it makes that much difference. 
 

It should also mean that it’s connection to the 220V supply should be either hard wired or at least using a rather special plug, as the standard Thai plug is maxed at 16A

[farmerjo]

1 hour ago, Crossy said:

You are going to need a special outlet or wire direct on its own 50A circuit on at least 6mm² preferably 10mm² cable

The shed has its own main power with a 60 amp breaker and fuse so will have to upgrade the wire size and outlet.

Sorry picture is a bit dark.

[sometimewoodworker]

1 hour ago, farmerjo said:

My electrical knowledge is not great but say i did bypass the AVR with my power supply then wouldn't the welder turn from a 300 amp machine to say a 50 amp one.

 

No not at all.
It is 300A at 32V

it is currently drawing under 50A at 220V 

220V is changed internally by the transformer or inverter down to the voltage you or the machine chooses.

 

Depending on the style of machine and your power supply bypassing the AVR may have zero effect all the way up to a large one.

 

It also sounds as if a little TLC may help with your power supply or at least give you enough information to persuade the PEA to do something to help

[sometimewoodworker]

6 minutes ago, farmerjo said:

The shed has its own main power with a 60 amp breaker and fuse so will have to upgrade the wire size and outlet.

Sorry picture is a bit dark.

What plug/connection does the welder have?

 

also an upgrade to the size of the supply cables to the shed may help but maybe of little benefit. It really depends on things like the PEA supply and if your power draw is dropping the PEA voltage 

[Crossy]

If you need an outlet / plug you are looking at a 63A "Commando" pair.

 

Something like this:-

 

 

[farmerjo]

5 minutes ago, sometimewoodworker said:

What plug/connection does the welder have?

 

[sometimewoodworker]

9 minutes ago, farmerjo said:

 

That is a standard 16A Shuko plug. 
 

So the information suggesting that it is a 300A at 32V machine  using that plug is completely fake. 
 

directly wired or using a commando plug is technically possible.

 

how about a picture of the welder? Do show please ???? 

 

Edit, it can be 300A at 12V and the plug will be OK

 

But it’s looking as if the house cat is pretending to be a sabre toothed tiger ????

[farmerjo]

14 minutes ago, Crossy said:

If you need an outlet / plug you are looking at a 63A "Commando" pair.

 

Something like this:-

 

 

So i would need two sets to have an extension cord as well.

 

@sometimewoodworker on page two of this thread is a picture and details if you open the link.

[sometimewoodworker]

Is this the pussy cat in question?

[JSon]

3 hours ago, farmerjo said:

Will check next time it's out of the box.

I don't think there is anyway to tell on the welder.

Is there a test i can do to find out.(multimeter,clamp meter)

Manual is in Thai but the jist i get is it will draw 12,500 watts at 300 amps.

I run an AVR which will show lights but not numbers.

 

 

@farmerjo

 

you can get one of these clamp meters:

https://www.kovet.com/product-page/400-600a-digital-clamp-meters-ut203

 

and use it like so:

 

 

 

[sometimewoodworker]

@farmerjo panic over, it is indeed one of these

not one of these

so no special plug needed.

 

But that doesn’t mean that your supply is as good as it should be.

 

it does mean that the AVR will have no problem. 
 

but the supply cables need checking as your voltage drops are quite possibly because of under sized cable

[farmerjo]

3 minutes ago, sometimewoodworker said:

@farmerjo panic over, it is indeed one of these

not one of these

so no special plug needed.

 

But that doesn’t mean that your supply is as good as it should be.

So how did you come to that conclusion?

[Crossy]

I think the use of the clamp meter on the INCOMING supply to the welder is required.

 

The rating plate definitely says around 50A at 220V. They might be relying on that Schuko not getting too hot during intermittent operation.

 

[farmerjo]

55 minutes ago, sometimewoodworker said:

also an upgrade to the size of the supply cables to the shed may help but maybe of little benefit. It really depends on things like the PEA supply and if your power draw is dropping the PEA voltage 

The supply cables are fine as they come direct from the AVR 20 metres away.

So i have no voltage drop on the welding side.

 

[sirineou]

On 1/14/2022 at 9:50 AM, Crossy said:

As @BritManToo notes, an auto-dimming mask is the best thing since sliced bread.

Just got one about a month ago and I have to agree, before that I could not see anything with those dark masks. 

As far as the welders are concerned, They are simple devices and for our proposes th    most of anything you buy at your local DYI store would do fine, I have one that I bought at DoHome,a few years ago  , I had to go downstairs to see what brand it was , LOL. 

I just finished doing the roof for a  storage / work shop behind the house, 

Stick welding thin wall square tubing is tricky , trying to get enough penetration to get a good weld, and at the same time not to blow a hole in the stock.is difficult.  I suggest the OP  , begin with  an as thick as possible  piece  of square metal tubing, and practice, I had some experience with mig welding doing lab work back at Uni,  Even did some aluminum welding and thought I was hot sh#t  I wa surprises and embarrassed wow bad I was at Arc welding.

Also I suggest the OP watches some YouTube Tutorial videos to get back up to speed again. 

[farmerjo]

13 minutes ago, Crossy said:

I think the use of the clamp meter on the INCOMING supply to the welder is required.

 

The rating plate definitely says around 50A at 220V. They might be relying on that Schuko not getting too hot during intermittent operation.

 

So should i still change the plugs as i will have some higher end amp welding to do later on?