I still suck at welding, but I have absolutely no trouble starting the arc now. I played around for an hour yesterday and did get it stuck twice, but, over all, it works much better. LOL. I'm working with light gauge metal purlins, they are crazy thin. I've been working with 6011 rod and it does OK,...

Correct. This is why I do not trust tradesmen just because they have a license. I have corrected more 'master electrician' work like this than I care to admit.

And yes, there is no short, so the breaker will not trip.

Either way, it is corrected now.

I killed the power, disassembled the outlet and found that the previous electrician had used ALL BLACK wires and custom labeled them. If it was a 240V outlet, it would have had two blacks -- both hot -- one from each leg of 120V. And a ground. Since the legs of 120V would be out of phase, the volta...

Yall nailed it. After deciding that I needed to check the wiring and start testing, I put the machine away. Upon unplugging the machine, I brushed the face plate of the outlet and received a little attention getting shock. I killed the power, disassembled the outlet and found that the previous elect...

I dunno. This isnt exactly rocket science. I don't know how to test brand new wiring from a 200A panel to a 50A subpanel. I have two machines performing similarly, so we're still looking at electrical somehow. I don't have any picutres. I messed with it today for about an hour and just ended up with...

Im going to start with a new piece of steel and weld a few beads. Then I'll make an attempt at a fillet weld in a corner as if I were welding a brace or something. Then, against my better judgement, maybe I can put a photo up and see if it tells us anything. Would that be useful?

Poland308 wrote:Does it have a polarity switch? Is it possible that your positive and neg cables are reversed.

Nah. You get on/off and a dial for amperage.

All AC, all the time.

I'll have to check all of that. No complaints on dimming lights. This machine is bone stock. It's not been messed with since purchased. Anyway, I did manage to get an arc struck. I can get a reasonably half crappy looking weld when Im just laying down a bead. When I attempt to weld something at a ri...

Couple questions: have you ever been able to strike an arc and weld with that machine? What is the other machine? An identical tombstone that also won't light up? If so, have you ever gotten the 2nd one to work properly in the same exactly place that you are right now? No. I have never used either ...

I went ahead and cleaned my work pieces like crazy just to make certain everything was clean. I'm down to bare metal now. The arc just won't start. I have two machines, so I went ahead and fired up the other one just in case the one I was using was dead. Anyway, same result. So...back to completely ...

I'm brand new to this, but I consider myself well above average in ability. I'm having an absolute beast of a time trying to get my AC225-S to strike an arc. I spent the better part of last night reading and watching videos so I could implement them today. This morning I spent about 4 hours and mana...