Welding Tips and Tricks

Thinking about buying an everlast 250ex. Has anyone that is NOT endorsed by everlast had good luck with these? I've seen mixed opinions with the brand, BUT have seen the same with lincoln and miller. Everyone has issues here and there. I just dont want to buy a machine that is worthless after the "5 year warranty". Anyone have one of these more than a year or even after the warranty has ran out?

It,s always a hard decision what to buy,
I am in Australia, bought my 250 EX about two and a half years ago. It has welded nicely mostly aluminium and some stainless. My machine did play up just recently, I sent an email to Everlast Aus and a replacement turned up two days later.
Amazing service, I have no complaints at all and I know I wouldn't get the same service from the big brands.
I have heard of some very expensive repairs to big brand welders and actually more than my machine cost new so with a five year warranty I fail to see where you can really go wrong even if it only lasted 5 years.
They do have a lot of electronics in them so in time things are bound to happen.
My Kemppi MIG cost over 5 times the Everlast machine and only one year warranty and I am far more worried about that giving me grief than my 250 EX.

If you dont mind me asking. What trouble were you having with your 250ex?

Yes no problem, I am assuming an internal fault in the power supply tripping the circuit breaker. I reset it and tripped again. It can happen with the best of them and the best thing was the immediate response from Everlast in getting a replacement to me in a couple of days being two and half years from purchase and they are probably about 1000kms from me.
On the other hand our brand name TIG where I work failed recently, symptoms being low power output. Sent back to their local repair shop and been well over a month and no welder yet and getting a bit frustrating not having it and I have actually had to bring a job home to get it done. Probably waiting for parts from China lol. It only had 12 months warranty, being now out of warranty and I am betting it will cost a bit for repairs.

Dang....Never even thought of that. So even if it does break out of warranty then it will cost hundreds and not thousands? lol

But getting back to your original question, Even if your Everlast was worthless after 5 years you would still be no worse off than buying a new big brand. I am sure that you would lose at least the value of the Everlast machine off the the top of what you would pay for the big brand after 5 years and possibly more.
I am very happy with the performance and features of the 250 EX and the back up service proved to be excellent. Don't know what else you could ask for.
Not doing anyone out of a job or anything by buying a locally supported import because I just wouldn't have one if I had to pay $5K or more for a similar spec machine, but I am now buying gas, consumables and other bits and pieces so by the way it helps the local economy too. All good so far.