Welding Tips and Tricks

While I'm waiting for my profile to be approved on Everlast's forums, I figured I'd pose the question here as well.

I have an Everlast 160sth and an SSC controls foot pedal.

When the foot pedal is plugged in, although I'm able to set the amperage on the machine, the readout simply oscillates back and forth between 11 and 12. I'm not able to see what the machine is set to unless I drop the pedal full-bore, then glance over.

I can't find this in the documentation anywhere, which is fairly minimal for these machines as you might know.

Does anyone have experience with these lines of machines and a foot pedal? Is there perhaps something wrong with my machine?

Kind of makes it some pretty janky guesswork to figure out where you're setting the machine. I do not have this issue with the 2T switch plugged in.

If that's how this machine works, it's definitely going back.

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Okay, so I gave a call to Everlast and figured I'd post the answer here. It's a known bug with the 160STH.

Sounds like they aren't going to do anything about it.

They told me to be able to see what amperage I'm setting the machine at that I need to pull the cable for the foot pedal adjust the amperage and then plug the foot pedal back in.

No. I'm not going to do that. So it goes back ...

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I hate Everlast.

DTM, let us know if the return goes smoothly.

I have a 164si and been lucky I guess. Just curious, when you're welding it bounces from 11 to 12, but when you release pedal completely it reads correct?

But I don't see any major problems with Everlast 160STH on Amazon....... most of the customers seem happy... and Everlast 160STH has gotten 4.6 stars out of 5 stars on Amazon.

Did you return the product, or are you still using with the direction suggested by the customer support regarding foot pedal?

If he's saying the readout only indicates the amperage when the pedal is not plugged in, that's lame. Id probably send it back too.
But if it's goofy when the pedal is pressed only, I for one can't tell you what it reads while I'm welding. I'm watching the puddle. In that case I'd keep it.
Monday I'll see how mine works.

DrivenToMake wrote:While I'm waiting for my profile to be approved on Everlast's forums, I figured I'd pose the question here as well.

I have an Everlast 160sth and an SSC controls foot pedal.

When the foot pedal is plugged in, although I'm able to set the amperage on the machine, the readout simply oscillates back and forth between 11 and 12. I'm not able to see what the machine is set to unless I drop the pedal full-bore, then glance over.

I can't find this in the documentation anywhere, which is fairly minimal for these machines as you might know.

Does anyone have experience with these lines of machines and a foot pedal? Is there perhaps something wrong with my machine?

Kind of makes it some pretty janky guesswork to figure out where you're setting the machine. I do not have this issue with the 2T switch plugged in.

If that's how this machine works, it's definitely going back.

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I have had good luck calling SCC Controls with a problem,
courteous, friendly and knowledgable answers.
440 205 1600 in Mentor, Ohio.

cptjackm wrote:

DrivenToMake wrote:While I'm waiting for my profile to be approved on Everlast's forums, I figured I'd pose the question here as well.

I have an Everlast 160sth and an SSC controls foot pedal.

When the foot pedal is plugged in, although I'm able to set the amperage on the machine, the readout simply oscillates back and forth between 11 and 12. I'm not able to see what the machine is set to unless I drop the pedal full-bore, then glance over.

I can't find this in the documentation anywhere, which is fairly minimal for these machines as you might know.

Does anyone have experience with these lines of machines and a foot pedal? Is there perhaps something wrong with my machine?

Kind of makes it some pretty janky guesswork to figure out where you're setting the machine. I do not have this issue with the 2T switch plugged in.

If that's how this machine works, it's definitely going back.

Sent from my SM-G925V using Tapatalk

I have had good luck calling SCC Controls with a problem,
courteous, friendly and knowledgable answers.
440 205 1600 in Mentor, Ohio.

It's an issue with the welder, not the pedal. The pedal is nice and works just fine.

I'm going to return the welder and get a different TIG unit, just not sure what yet.

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I like my 210EXT. I know it's a lot more money, but so far so good. Both AC & DC. Are you looking to stay with Everlast, or try another brand?


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dgapilot wrote:I like my 210EXT. I know it's a lot more money, but so far so good. Both AC & DC. Are you looking to stay with Everlast, or try another brand?


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I'm probably going to return this and roll the credit (purchased at Home Depot with holiday/birthday gift cards) into an i-TIG 201. The main thing is, I have this foot pedal that was $160. So I'm somewhat locked into getting another Everlast welder.

I don't really need AC, because I don't plan on working with aluminum.

I know you kind of take a chance with a company like Everlast, but I'm a little disenchanted with their approach of calling a defect a "quirk".

"It won't affect your welds."

Your machine has a known defect, and that's your plan? Tell me it won't affect my welds?

So I will try the I-TIG, and if I don't like it I will return that to Home Depot as well and eat the cost/sell the foot pedal at a loss. I'm done with them as a company.

I certainly won't be buying anything else from them either.


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Any chance it's just the way the pedal is wired? Do you live close to someone with another Everlast machine that you could try an Everlast pedal to see if it behaves the same?


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dgapilot wrote:Any chance it's just the way the pedal is wired? Do you live close to someone with another Everlast machine that you could try an Everlast pedal to see if it behaves the same?


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No chance it's the pedal. There are 3 circuits at work in the pedal. 7 Contacts. Contacts 6 & 7 are shorted. That tells the welder there is a pedal plugged in. 3/4/5 are connected to the potentiometer, which controls the amperage through the pedal's range of motion. 1/2 are the momentary, which lights off the HF start, argon and arc.

As a sanity check, I ran the pedal through it's paces on a meter and a scope.

Pedal is wired correctly and works as intended.

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nelson wrote:DTM, let us know if the return goes smoothly.

I have a 164si and been lucky I guess. Just curious, when you're welding it bounces from 11 to 12, but when you release pedal completely it reads correct?

Home Depot will take it back, no problem. It's the main reason that I ordered it through them.

No, pedal plugged in, not welding, the display bounces back and forth between 11 and 12. No matter where you set the amperage.

Once you start welding, it does display the amperage based on where you have the pedal in its range of motion. I only know this because I lit it off on a piece of scrap so that I could see what the display was doing during welding.

I agree that you could easily set the welder to a particular amperage and leave it there while you're welding the same thickness of material, same fit-ups.

But practicing on a wide variety of set ups and material thicknesses makes amperage adjustments a pain.

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That would be a pain to have to unplug the pedal to adjust amperage, then plug it back in. I've seen Jody use a 160STH in some of his videos, but never looked at the display when he wasn't welding.


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nelson wrote:If he's saying the readout only indicates the amperage when the pedal is not plugged in, that's lame. Id probably send it back too.
But if it's goofy when the pedal is pressed only, I for one can't tell you what it reads while I'm welding. I'm watching the puddle. In that case I'd keep it.
Monday I'll see how mine works.

Right, if that's what it was doing I couldn't care less.

I know a lot more experienced welders can set their welder to max amperage and control everything on any thickness of material, but I can't do that. I want to set the amperage 20%~ above what I'm going to need so that I can quickly puddle and ease off.

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DrivenToMake wrote:I know a lot more experienced welders can set their welder to max amperage and control everything on any thickness of material, but I can't do that.
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Even so this is anything but an ideal situation, if I needed to make a weld at 30 amps no way I'd set my machine to 210 amps

The only stake I have in Everlast is my unit with 1 year and no probs.

Quite disconcerting. I guess your unit didn't come with a pedal? 160 is a lot for 2 stampings, a spring, a pot, switch and a cord.

The strain relief on mine came loose so I know how to open it up....it's just pried open, not screwed. Kinda low end.

What'd your welder cost? I love being able to do aluminum in my work.

When I got my 210 EXT a couple weeks ago, I got the Nova foot pedal upgrade with 25' chord. They only charged $100 for the upgrade. Goth the 25' cables for both torches, and a CK flex head 9, and I think that was only a $10 upgrade. Kind of hard to see how the pedal cost that much.

nelson wrote:The only stake I have in Everlast is my unit with 1 year and no probs.

Quite disconcerting. I guess your unit didn't come with a pedal? 160 is a lot for 2 stampings, a spring, a pot, switch and a cord.

The strain relief on mine came loose so I know how to open it up....it's just pried open, not screwed. Kinda low end.

What'd your welder cost? I love being able to do aluminum in my work.

No, it didn't come with a pedal. Ironically, they used to offer the pedal as part of the package. I had been researching what TIG welder to buy for quite some time and settled on this one because of my impression that it was going to come with a pedal. My fault, but I didn't verify that it still came with a foot pedal as part of the package. I was a little bit surprised when it arrived and it did not have one. So when looking for a foot pedal, SSC controls was universally recommended. If you think they're expensive, you should see what a Miller pedal costs.

dgapilot wrote:When I got my 210 EXT a couple weeks ago, I got the Nova foot pedal upgrade with 25' chord. They only charged $100 for the upgrade. Goth the 25' cables for both torches, and a CK flex head 9, and I think that was only a $10 upgrade. Kind of hard to see how the pedal cost that much.

I looked into making my own, but the components were coming to a cost that didn't make it worth my time. I guess it really depends on what they are using inside. According to SSC, they're using a precision potentiometer. If I go to Mouser, a 2-watt precision potentiometer is in the $40 range. Momentary is like $10-15. Cable only comes in like 400 foot spools, so I have to go to a different company for that and that would be around $30 with shipping. Connector is like $10 shipped. Then I have to fab a pedal, or try to salvage a pedal from something else.

In the end I decided I just want to get welding.

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Apparently, I ticked off some Everlast representative in their forums by posting this issue there.

What a rambling jack-hole response...

He says this is the design of the machine. It's reading where the starting amperage will be 11-12, based on the potentiometer position. And that the display updates actual amperage as you depress the pedal. You set the amperage based on the relative position of the knob.

Fair enough, but that's not what the tech support guy told me.

Not winning any friends that guy...

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So that bobbing between 11 and 12 makes sense now. It's the AD circuit parsing the pot position.

I'm intrigued. If you floor the pedal does it indicate the max amps? I know they pissed you off but I could live with that. Maybe.

Mine goes down to 5 amps and that's what I need sometimes for small stuff so starting at 11 isn't good for me.

You better not post anything over there even remotely critical of everlast or the trolls come out in force. I looked at a 250ex but wanted a 25' air cooled torch and a hand control to make it portable. I was quoted 1700.00 but could not get an exact list of what I was or wasnt getting. I put this problem on that forum and they spent two weeks bashing me and never even read what the problem was. I finally posted screenshots of the email chain and they apparently didnt read that either. It was crazy. Everlast never tried to resolve the issue just bashed me and lied about the content of the conversation even after it was posted.

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nelson wrote:So that bobbing between 11 and 12 makes sense now. It's the AD circuit parsing the pot position.

I'm intrigued. If you floor the pedal does it indicate the max amps? I know they pissed you off but I could live with that. Maybe.

Mine goes down to 5 amps and that's what I need sometimes for small stuff so starting at 11 isn't good for me.

Yep, bury the pedal, it reads the max you have it set to.

Not ideal, but I could live with it for a while. This is just my entrance into TIG. I always start small with any of my equipment to figure out what I like and don't like before I invest 2-3k in something.

I'm not pissed at all. I'm genuinely surprised that they treat customers like this. He pointed me to some link that won't load that supposedly explains the function of the display.

I don't work at Everlast. Put it in the manual, or the product page. I read everything I could find before posting.

Teach your tech guy not to call intended functionality a "quirk".

The big investment will NOT be Everlast. I don't reward disrespect with my dollars.

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Warrenh wrote:You better not post anything over there even remotely critical of everlast or the trolls come out in force. I looked at a 250ex but wanted a 25' air cooled torch and a hand control to make it portable. I was quoted 1700.00 but could not get an exact list of what I was or wasnt getting. I put this problem on that forum and they spent two weeks bashing me and never even read what the problem was. I finally posted screenshots of the email chain and they apparently didnt read that either. It was crazy. Everlast never tried to resolve the issue just bashed me and lied about the content of the conversation even after it was posted.

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Ridiculous. Yeah, whoever they have running that forum is ruining relationships. The guy is seriously delusional.

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I have a solution to the issue which will give me the functionality I'm looking for.

In the pedal's plug, pins 6 and 7 are shorted (intentionally). This tells the welder a pedal is plugged in.

I am going to open up the connector and sever the short. I'll solder in two short jumper wires and feed those out of the strain relief.

I'll then solder to those jumpers an NC momentary switch.

In normally closed state, welder operates as it does now. Press the momentary, welder thinks no pedal is plugged in, adjust amperage, display updates.

No need to unplug pedal.

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