I have been watching craiglist for deals on miller/hobart/lincoln migs but none so far. I am about to pull the trigger on an AHP 140 mig. My priorities are:

Cheap (planning to spend another $1000 on a tig this fall)
Not going to electrocute me
Rheostat voltage adjustment

 

I've also been cruising craigslist for a MIG welder and have come up empty...probably the same CLs as you...

There was one decent Lincoln 140 but the guy never responded...typical CL'er.

I was thinking of just going with the Eastwood. They seem to have good reviews, good support, etc. etc.

 

I have no regrets with my Eastwood MIG. I had something fall over on my first unit and land square in the power switch. Eastwood tech first tried to help me repair it and when that didn't work they swapped it out for a new (refurb) because it was still under the 3 yr. warranty. The gas valve started sticking on the refurb and the part was $16 delivered. Took about 4 weeks to get it because it was out of stock. But imo that's a pretty good experience.

 

I think I talked to that guy. First he refused to sell it separately from a generator and then couldn't tell me what model it was beyond "lincoln 140"- Then he emailed me a few times asking me to make an offer.

 

Email sent last week. Voicemail left this morning. Nothing back yet.

 

AHP pulled their mig welders off of the website so I guess I am either going to wait or look for other options around the same price.

 

I just got an eastwood 135. I picked up a gas bottle and tried to get it running last night- the fitting for the gun into the welder was messed up and it was leaking all of the shielding gas. Finally figured that out and layed down a few beads today and it works great. Its not quite as nice as the miller 252 I am used to
Mostly boogers from when the gas wasn't working, a few welds from this morning:

 

High freq start cap is toasted. Going to give them a week to respond before I pull the thing apart and find a replacement cap myself.

 

Wow I hope mine holds up. Last fall I picked up a AHP Alphatig 200x. It has been working out great so far. It's for hobby use so I didn't want to drop all that money on a blue or red machine. It probably has around 30-35 hours on it so far. Of course the stock torch sucks *** so I threw a CK9 flex head with a gas lens on there. Everything is really simply laid out in ***** so you don't have to hunt through menus and push the button 50 times to get it on the setting you want.If I remember right I picked it up for $750.

 

Pushed the cap away from the posts and HF start works again.

Must have been shorting out.

 

Anyone looking for a decent mig should check out Lowes. I was told some of the stores (but not all) are no longer selling welders. I just bought a brand new Pro-Mig 180 for 330 bucks! I also bought a few 10lb flux core spools of wire for 12 bucks each.

 

No such luck in my neck of the woods.

 

3 minutes on the phone yesterday and a new high frequency board is arriving at my house tomorrow. No shipping charge.

 

Was that the first time you called them or did they just take this long to get in touch with you?

 

They ignored my messages from friday. But I called on monday and they picked up quickly.

If i were to do it again i wouldn't leave a message. Just keep trying until they pick up.

 

weldingtipsandtricks.com is doing a giveaway of an AHP AlphaTIG 200x for newsletter subscribers.


So far, I'm loving mine. Steel welds looking good, moved on to brushing up on my aluminum for my intake and coolant hard lines coming up soon. Playing with different electrode varieties and thicknesses (my that stuff adds up fast), thoriated tungsten welds thin aluminum better than most people say. Trying out some lanthanated stuff now.



Also in that pic, recently upgraded helmets to a Hobart Pro Series. Sweet jesus it's a night and day difference from welding with a cheap one.

And a couple days ago I picked up this Hobart 210mvp off craigslist for a killer deal, new and unused.



Plugs in to 115 or 230 and auto-adjusts accordingly. Got some 308 wire and going to pick up a small bottle of tri mix so I can quickly tack exhaust pieces before jigging it for the TIG.

 

Boys in the tooling shop spent 6k on a machine the other day.



Couple of thoughts.
Not sure who spends 6k on a machine like this and doesn't pay the extra couple hundred or whatever it is for some options.
I guess it's the same person who didn't consult your friendly turbo miata owner in the maintenance department about power requirements.(100 ******* FLA!)
As a proud owner of a Miller machine myself, the purchase price, build quality, and options with this machine makes me wonder how this company still sells a product.
It welds nice, but leaves something to be desired.
Who paints Bridgeports white?

 

Had me lol'ing

 

before doing your exhaust, check out: at 13:00 he starts fabricating his exhaust. also builds a most clever jig for a cutoff saw. i love project binky. the best fabricator i've ever seen.

 

Cool project - hope they finish!