delcbr

was in Aldi today and seen 2 welding plants one at £40 electric arc welder and one at £80 a mig welder turbo fan no gas needed as the wire it uses gives off a gas when its being used.

i always thought the best one to get would be one that uses gas.
any one on here tell me what to look for as i dont want to buy it and find out later its crap.

what spec should i look for a descent mig welder?
thanx

GC8

Youre better with gas. Can it use gas or is it special wire only?

jonny_693

iTrader: (5)

Cant see it being much cop to be honest you'd prob get a better weld with the arc one. The replacement wire will prob cost a fortune aswell.

delcbr

its special wire it cant use gas

dpb

They had a 16 quid 1200w router in there the other week - sounds great 'sept its a full kilo heavier than comparable

Th router table tho IS a bargain

rob 666

iTrader: (1)

Be £80 for a reason mate, always found gas less to be crap

twooo

iTrader: (3)

I'll go with the rest of the comments here. Gas migs work much better. Which is why they're more expensive. You'll end up buying it, trying to weld something once, think "this is crap" and it'll sit in your garage gathering dust forever more.

Basis of most power tools really. A router for £16?? Mine cost over 10 times that, a price I'm happy to pay. I honestly wouldn't touch a £16 router. I wouldn't even plug the thing in the wall to be honest.

tanyatriangles

iTrader: (2)

Showed both welding rigs to my lad, who works, (when he has a job) as a welder/plater.


He just shook his head and walked away laughing.

Dedrater

Surly with a £16 router the only thing you need to worry about is the bits your using with it? plus it probably only has 2 position plung stop and no guide.

dpb

No, its got a guide and everything

PaulC72

in my younger years I spent 10 years in metalwork fabrication and have used many a welder.

Stay clear of the gas less ones and they are really only good for max setting welding and they cannot usually cope with much of that anyway, nothing too big {or thick} I must say even though mig welding is easy I have always enjoyed the correct arc welding as that itself is an art

David_Dickson

Gassless mig is perfectly acceptable, and is very handy in certain situations - welding outdoors for one, the wind can blow away the shielding gas on a normal mig.
Gasless welding is rarely as neat looking and tends to splatter more than gas mig, but with a little practice and a few minutes cleanup afterwards, is just as good.
However, it really needs the metal to be perfectly clean before welding. Gas mig can cope with certain contaminants, paint, rust etc, but gasless is a nightmare on badly prepped metal.

As for this specific one for £80 - I wouldnt other. I would imagine its the same or similar to another I looked at a while back. IIRC the lowest current setting was something silly like 80 amps, which is far too high for use on anything like car bodywork.

If you are serious about getting into welding, get a gas mig and dont spend under about £150 minimum. Avoid SIP and Cosmo as they are renowned for poor quality wire feed, which makes welding well harder especially for a novice.
Look for a unit with a minimum current of 30, maybe 40 amps or less. Its unlikley you will really need anything with a max over 130amps for general automotive and light fabrication work.

If you have some time, look on MIG Welding - The DIY Guide its a very handy forum with good tutorials and buying guides.

spray1974

Your better to give it a wide birth, take it from a fabricator/welder.

They are alright for very very small light stuff but if your trying to make a trailer or something they are crap..

Luke

those aldi tools where badly finished and weighed a ton !!!! but i bought some of the router bits and they steamed through MDF very well.

M444GY

iTrader: (72)

aldi welder does it come with one of these

delcbr

Give this guy a clap thanks