Welding Tips and Tricks

I'm still in school and learnig mig right now I'm going on to stick & tig after it's for hobby ( I'm to old to change career) but I always wanted to weld . My thing is I going to buy a welder and I'm thinking of the Hobart 210 I know I do not want any thing smaller I just like to here from any one who may have one or knows of some one that has one thanks . Joe.

Getting one off of a forum will be hard becuase forums are international.

Check your local craigslists ads. When I bought my first welder, I bought a new one becuase i didnt want to get stuck repairing something that i knew nothing about, but , come to find out, most welders of tough sons of bitches, and don't need much maintainence.

So check out craigslist, i"m sure you can get something up there at a very good price. Hell, I once bought a never once used lincoln tombstone ac welder for 150 bucks(listed at 300 i think). The guy realized that he just didnt have a use for it after he bought it! I realized the same thing about two months later and sold it for 100 dollers.

anyway, good luck.

-Rick

Also, hobart is not a bad brand, but it is a hobbyist brand, so it won't be as full of bells and whistles as the machines you are probably using at your school, but, it'll still work fine. When buying welders, it is important to know what amperage range you want, and the duty cycle as well, and look for that in a welder.

-Rick

my boss just passed down an old lincoln tombstone to me the thing is about 20 years old and spent most of its life in the back of a dirty old shop probablly under a couple cases of spent natural light cans , the machine still runs like a deer , brand new i believe there selling for 280$ at lows i would spend the money and go with a lincoln. there built to last plain and simple .

Someone said earlier on here, and I'll repeat it again- Those who are cheap, end up paying more in the long run.

If you buy a cheap machine, its not going to do everything you want it to do a few years from now (believe me, I went this route). And your going to have to buy another machine, and either keep or sell the machine you already have.

LIncoln and Miller are great brands, but you should also check out everlast. Im not giong to go into all the pros and cons (you can find them easily enough with a search on the forums), but the everlast is around half the price of lincoln and miller.

Good luck and have fun, weldings a blast! And very frustrating when your first learning, so dont give up!