Page 1 of 1
Ebay welders???
Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 3:25 pm
by brighty
Does anyone know about these welders and if they are reliable/easy to use.... parts readily available etc????
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-250AMP-MIG-W ... dZViewItem
He seems to have great feedback so I'm guessing they are ok.... just thought someone from here might have used them before.
Cheers.
Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 4:59 pm
by Ruggers
ive been looking at them as well they go for around the 800 mark also has anyone used or bought there inverter mig welder i thought they look like the go these days. as for parts the wire feed looks indentical to our one at work and the hand piece is a standard euro that most welders use and parts are easliy intercanged.
Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 5:04 pm
by awill4x4
I wish the 240 volt Tig welder I put a deposit on yesterday only cost that much, this time next week I'll be $5500 poorer
Still, onsite precision Tig welding "here I come".
Regards Andrew.
Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 7:24 pm
by MART
Ive used different migs over the last 20 years and I currently have a uni mig 275. I find it doesn,t have enough power to join thicker metals but it is fine upto 6mm. I use a stick welder for all my structual work,but that one looks okay for the money,also it might have a 15amp plug,so you can change it or you might have to get a 15amp power point. Also make sure you only get a 3 metre gun as 4 metre ones tend to jam,don,t know what that one has,Cheers Paul.
Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 8:03 pm
by AJ
awill4x4 wrote:I wish the 240 volt Tig welder I put a deposit on yesterday only cost that much, this time next week I'll be $5500 poorer
Still, onsite precision Tig welding "here I come".
Regards Andrew.
Ooooooh I like new toys. Details?

Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 8:12 pm
by familybus
ive also got one coming next week or so! ive bought a new Migomag 260, cant wait to get it home!

Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 7:57 am
by awill4x4
AJ wrote:awill4x4 wrote:I wish the 240 volt Tig welder I put a deposit on yesterday only cost that much, this time next week I'll be $5500 poorer
Still, onsite precision Tig welding "here I come".
Regards Andrew.
Ooooooh I like new toys. Details?

Never you mind Fronius boy. Fronius just got themselves a genuine competitor in the new range of Kemppi machines.
I've decided to get the new Kemppi MLS 2300 single phase 240V AC/DC machine with all the bells and whistles.
It's similar in size and weight and features to the Fronius Magicwave but has 230 amps versus 220 for the Fronius and is significantly cheaper by about $1000.
You also don't have to use Fronius consumables just generic Weldcraft types
so I'll save a fortune there as I've already got a heap of Weldcraft consumables already.
I've been using one doing some welding after hours for a guy who has the machine and I'm very impressed.
it's a really nice machine to use.
Here's a link to its features Herc,
Just click on AC/DC machines.
You and I know what they really mean, all the Mig guys can only dream of what these things can do.
http://www.kemppi.com/inet/kemppi/en/ak ... uct%20Info
Regards Andrew.
Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 11:56 am
by AJ
awill4x4 wrote:Here's a link to its features Herc,
Just click on AC/DC machines.
Nice machine. The control you get with the new machines is awesome, but probably only 1% of users will get full benefit from them. I know you love pushing the envelope and will get the most out of this machine.
awill4x4 wrote:You and I know what they really mean, all the Mig guys can only dream of what these things can do.
Well.... yes and no.

90% of our pipe weldng is now done with STT MIG and only the out of position stuff (and the exotic materials) is done with TIG.
Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 12:51 pm
by AFeral
The Kempi units are very nice but the new 230 amp units are $1000 more than the old 200 amp units which seems like a lot of money for a 30 amp advantage. Will be looking for a 200 amp unit, if there are any letf later this year.
As for the cheapo ebay units. Would be intrested to know how well they work. What would be more intresting to know is how long before they break. How good the warrenty is. How easy exspensive they are to repair once the warrenty runs out.
Would probally be easyer to pick up a good second hand branded unit than a cheapo ebay job.
Posted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 10:02 pm
by awill4x4
AFeral wrote:The Kempi units are very nice but the new 230 amp units are $1000 more than the old 200 amp units which seems like a lot of money for a 30 amp advantage. Will be looking for a 200 amp unit, if there are any letf later this year.
As for the cheapo ebay units. Would be intrested to know how well they work. What would be more intresting to know is how long before they break. How good the warrenty is. How easy exspensive they are to repair once the warrenty runs out.
Would probally be easyer to pick up a good second hand branded unit than a cheapo ebay job.
There's only a few of the 200 amp ones left and they will probably sell pretty quickly.
The new ones are smaller, lighter and have less current draw. (16 amps vs 20+).
Where I'm welding after hours the guy has both machines, the old one
will trip the circuit breaker on high amps while the new one doesn't
They also have hybrid wave mix tig and sine wave welding as well.
(very good for external corner welding.)
DC welding arc is very good and handled some high pulse welding of a Titanium
frame very well.
Regards Andrew.
Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 12:15 am
by zagan
Looks good.
I'd be susing out replacable parts for the wire motor, the wire feed looks the same as a lincon machines.
Duty time is ok I guess if your not going to heaps of thick stuff 8mm+
I'd dump the old style US gun though to a new style US screw gun though otherwise you'll be up for heaps of dosh, $35 gas defusers and nozzles each can be costly, unles you got a business account somewhere might offset the costs a bit.
Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 7:52 am
by brighty
So, in all the conversations here..... no-one has bought or used one of these units to say exactly what they are like... good/bad or otherwise???
Was hoping for someone with personal experience with them....
Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 8:05 am
by AJ
brighty wrote:So, in all the conversations here..... no-one has bought or used one of these units to say exactly what they are like... good/bad or otherwise???
Was hoping for someone with personal experience with them....
Is it significantly cheaper than something like a Cigweld 210?
Purchase cost vs cost of consumables, warranty and service backup.
Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 1:34 pm
by Patroler
I know a guy who has the same welder, just with analogue dials and 200 amps, same wire feeder etc, and he loves it, reckons it is great to use and heaps of power.
He brought his from the same ebay store, can't say about spares as he hasn't needed any - not much inside to go wrong, but like most of these welders a lot of the parts are interchangeable with brand name stuff, e.g. my TIG is from the same guy and uses a Binzel torch, collets, etc
Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 5:50 pm
by zagan
brighty wrote:So, in all the conversations here..... no-one has bought or used one of these units to say exactly what they are like... good/bad or otherwise???
Was hoping for someone with personal experience with them....
All MIG welders (all welders really) do the exact same thing.
It purely down to what your doing with it, will show if it's good for what your doing with it.
Duty time is something to look out for, This welder is 55% at 170amps, this means if your using 170amps if you weld for 5 mins you'll have to stop for 5 mins to let the welder cool down again.
What happens is that if your not doing long welds the time between welds might be enough time to allow it to cool down, if you use more amps the longer the duty cycle is and the less amount of time you have to weld, IE more stopping basicly, less amps and it's the other way around more welding time less stopping.
If you go over the duty cycle it might flip the breaker or the welder could over heat.
The TIG welder that's being talked about on here has a lower duty cycle than the old one going by the website, if I'm looking at the right ones there's only 2 tigs in that bit, 200amps at 70% compared to 230 at 70% duty cycle.
But TIG has a lot more settings so duty cycle can probably be changed by a large margin, I havn't used TIG myself, but I do like Stick now that's an art

few people these days can stick weld really well.