Wire Welder

[cj315]

Can anyone recommend a good wire welder? What size should I be looking at for welding automotive sheet metal?

 

[Ken-Pa]

Miller puts out a great 110 volt mig welder . I have a Miller Cricket 110 . They only made it a couple years . They replaced it with the 130 . Wire size mine uses is .030 or .035 .I use gas with it for best adhesion . It will also weld aluminum as long as the proper gas is used .HTH ! God bless

 

[CJ3b_jeep]

hobart, miller or Lincoln are all good units. I have a Clark, which works fine, but when it goes bad, I'll get a miller.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Is that all you're ever going to do? Don't get a machine that only runs flux-core. For body work you can use a 120 volt machine but you want at least a 120 amp machine(140 and up is even better). I'd stick with a Lincoln or Miller/Hobart. If you're doing lots of body work, you can get fancy machines with spot welding timers and other special features. You probably need to spend in the $450/$500 range to get a decent welder that won't give you fits and will be still be working in a few years with parts available. Dave

 

[Anonymous-0]

For body work you probably want to use .023 wire. Dave

 

[Lloyd In South Carolina]

I have a Miller 110v unite, 135. Works great, has for 12 years. I have a lot of hours on it. I use gas, not flux core.

 

[730d se]

I have had a 110V Lincoln Mig Welder with gas for 6 years. For what you are going to do, this size will work great.
Miller and others also make a 110V Mig, just never owned or operated any other.
My other welder is a 220V Lincoln AC/DC "buzz box".
Those two units cover most of anything I would ever need.

 

[S.Crum]

I have a Hobart 180 I bought new a couple years ago. This is a 240 volt machine but smaller like a 140. I bought it as a 'factory refurbished' unit from a company on fleabay. It was about $500 delivered. This can use gas or flux core. I've never used flux core. I've used it primarily for auto body but I could use it up to non-critical 3/16" if needed.

 

[Goose]

I have a 220 volt Clarke, and I'm not sure I'd buy another one. I got this one for half price from a farm store that was going out of business.

Took about five years of tinkering to make a decent welder out of it. The main problem, and I've expounded on this on this forum before, was it had a plastic liner to feed the wire through the tube. When it heated up, the plastic liner would bind the wire and cause a jam. The first few years I had the unit, I wasted more wire clearing jams than I used for welding.

Once I figured out what the problem was and replaced it with a steel liner from Hobart, the jam problem was solved. I run straight CO2 for gas, and it doesn't do too bad.

When you realize that any stick or wirefeed welder is simply a controlled short circuit, it simplifies how you look at them.

 

[jturbo10]

I would recommend a 240 volt Hobart, Miller, or Lincoln 185-210 amp gas/flux Mig welder. I have a 240V/185 amp Hobart gas/flux Mig welder that I bought on the internet for about $600 dollars that came with a welding cart and numerous welding accessories. I use a triple gas rather than flux wire and I don"t buy any Chinese made wire just the good stuff. Never had one issue with the machine and I weld a lot of sheet metal and equipment parts with the Hobart. Not an ideal machine for welding heavy duty parts but that is not what it is made for. You can go from novice to journeyman welder fairly quickly if you experiment with wire speed and temp ranges on sample pieces. Make sure you can buy parts for what ever machine you buy...if you buy good quality at the beginning you likely will not need parts as often as the cheap machines. MIG welders like a good ground so clean up the welding surfaces before you try to weld. Lots of good books available on MIG/TIG welding if you are a beginner. Good luck.

 

[mecanik69]

Millermatic 140 with autoset.I bought one 3 years ago it works great it works great on light gauge steel and i have welded 1/4'' and 3/16'' with no problems just not for a long period of time as it will kick out the duty cycle.

 

[ScottP]

CJ
Buy the best and biggest welder you can afford! Don't buy one based on what you want to weld today but on what you might have to weld tomorrow. Leave the china junk alone, hard to get consumables for them.
I have a Miller 250MP and I weld anything I want from stove pipe on up.

Scott

 

[trucker 40]

I would buy a 220 volt MIG welder.Right now you want to weld sheet metal but once you get the welder I guarantee that you will want to do other projects.A 110 volt welder will weld the heck out of sheet metal,but for anything else its just too slow.You can get a welder that will weld good nowdays and it will cost about as much for a good 110 volt welder as a good 220 volt welder.Probably a Lincoln is what you want,but there are Millers and Hobarts and others that are good too.You want one that uses a tank of gas like CO2 OR Argon/CO2 mix for sheetmetal.
You can get all different kinds of wire and even put a spool gun on a 220 welder.I saw that Eastwood has a wire welder you can buy that comes with a spool gun.Then with argon gas you can weld Aluminum.Thats what you want,something you can use a lot of different ways,especially if you repair cars.The 220 welders are just better all around for working with.
You have to be a good welder to weld with a 110 volt wire welder.You can be a fair welder and do a decent job with a 220 welder as they just work better.You would have to run multipass welds to weld 1/4 inch steel with a 110 volt welder.You can weld 3/8 with one pass on a 220 welder.

 

[1941FarmallAboy]

(quoted from post at 05:01:58 12/19/10) Can anyone recommend a good wire welder? What size should I be looking at for welding automotive sheet metal?

Auto Sheet Metal! GET A TIG !!

 

[Puddles]

(quoted from post at 16:45:04 12/19/10)

(quoted from post at 05:01:58 12/19/10) Can anyone recommend a good wire welder? What size should I be looking at for welding automotive sheet metal?

Auto Sheet Metal! GET A TIG !!

Not a good idea. Too much concentrated heat. :wink:

 

[Anonymous-0]

95% of autobody is done with MIG. TIG can be used and do a real nice job but you have to be a pretty good TIG welder to do it. Definitely not something for the beginner. C25 gas should be used with MIG on autobody. Dave

 

[BANDITFARMER]

I have a Miller 135 110 volt welder that I got 5 years ago. I weld car sheet metal to sheet steel up to 1/8 inch, Any heaver I use a stick welder. As farm welds go I weld all the sheet metal with the mig with anything from .023 .030 .035 and .045 mig wire, solid and metal core wire and SIB wire. I still like to weld heavy steel with a stick welder. I used to make metal core wire and learned alot about mig welders and what wire to use in different situations. We made wire from .023 to .078 and what wire the average guy will never use .078 wire. For what you are wanting to use it for a Miller or Lincoln 110volt mig welder would be what I would chose. Stick with a name brand! Bandit

 

[36 Coupe]

My 110 volt line measures 122 volt these days.The 220 volt line measures 244 now.