Anybody ever buy/use one of these cheapo tig's from ebay? how do they do on simple light duty jobs like manifolds and piping?

http://cgi.ebay.com/THERMAL-AR...wItem



http://cgi.ebay.com/ARC-WELDER...wItem

 

Thermal-Arc is a good brand. 85 amps won't get you too far though.

 

i have been talking to a friend that builds several manifolds for d and b series turbo setups and has a smiley tools plasma/arc/tig combo, seems to work very well for him.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by backpurge &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Thermal-Arc is a good brand. 85 amps won't get you too far though.</TD></TR></TABLE>

will it not do the things i described above?

 

Harbor freight sells those bottom ones for like a lil over 200. Kinda tempting but the first one doesn't look too bad. A tig welder that runs on 110? I'd be kinda leary on it.

 

i use a small tig much like the ones pictured, but not those brands. i believe it is a 130. it works great for light-med stuff(dc only), it does charge piping, exhaust piping(16g), and sched 40 no problem. its a scratch start, no pedal control or anything, so its hard to get the level of quality that you can with a nice machine. but it works great for the stuff i use it for.

edit it is also 110 or 120v, just plug it in to any old socket, but it does like to pop breakers on weak circuits

 

this is the stuff a guy i know has been making using a cheap tig thats similar.

doesnt seem to be too bad for quality, definitely up to my standards.

 

there is a guy on ebay that sells used PowCon 300ST inverters every now and then. I'd look into those. It is a 300 amp welder, connects to 230v single phase, does DC+ and DC- (no AC tho), has hot start and foot pedal input. they go for like $450. pretty good deal IMO

 

I got the bottom chicago electric for $100 on ebay. I have yet to try it out.

 

so what unit was used to weld those? I would be content with one of those, not to bad looking.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Syner-G-Racing &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
so what unit was used to weld those? I would be content with one of those, not to bad looking. </TD></TR></TABLE>

that would be this unit from smiley tools, its a combo plasma cutter/arc/tig unit

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-30-A-P...wItem

 

not bad.

I have been looking at some harbor freight stuff too. But everything (almost) I have bought from them has been broken or broke seconds after first use

 

fookle - got some close-ups of the beads??

 

nah

 

Hey ****, a buddy and I are looking into either the Smiley, or the Themal Arc. If i get it before you, I'll let you know!

 

word, solid.

 

dave and i own a smily tools, it worls awesome.

nothing compares to a goos solid tig, we have a old school suncrowave 300 and it runs circles around the cheapos, ..


we also have hadgoosuccess with harbor freight.

 

Save your pennies and get a halfway decent tig. You get what you pay for.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SiRex91 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Save your pennies and get a halfway decent tig. You get what you pay for.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Dont be poopin in here

It's about how great of a weld can be created and user opinion is on these welders.

 

too bad those manifolds dave made were with the shop miller syncrowave 300..

the extent of use for the china special has been the plasma cutter function. although it does an exceptable job on the charge pipes.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by baphomet &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">not bad.

I have been looking at some harbor freight stuff too. But everything (almost) I have bought from them has been broken or broke seconds after first use </TD></TR></TABLE>

this is no lie. lol i feel your pain. damn harbor freight

 

A buddy got the Harbor Frieght Arc/tig welder when it was on sale. It arc weld pretty good, considering the size of the machine. However we have not tried the Tig welder part of the machine yet.

-Kevin

 

i want to know how some of these cheaper harbor freight welders work and how the beads look like, fluxcore or with argon.

 

Bump. I wanna know more about cheap welders- who's used them, on what, and what the results were. I keep debating TIG versus MIG and cheap versus me broke for a long time. I'd like to do some manifolds, downpipes, and intercooler piping on my own cars myself.

Another Q. These cheap TIGs, will they work on SS? Aluminum?

I've heard of MIG for stainless and aluminum, but everyone seems to do TIG instead. What is the difference in the difficulty and the quality of the final product?

Tim

 

the cheap tigs work wel enough to make manifolds.

they do not weld aluminum. they are also good for making charge piping.

they lack adjustablity, and amperage. 130amp max on alot of them.

but if your looking for something to just dik around with in the gargae, theyll be fine. dave and i have owned a smiley tools tig/arc/plasma for a while now, with excellent results. granted we use it 95 percent of the time for the plasma cutter though. we do make charge pipes with it. we make out manifolds, and do our aluminum welding with our shop syncrowave 300

 

If you end up gettin' one ****, lemme know.. Then we'll have to do some exhaust for my wip...

Hell! I'll even pitch in on it if I can use it sometimes!