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New tool of the day: Hooray craigslist! $425, works fine, and my landlord even wired up the 220V for free (since he was putting it in for his welder, he ran a 2nd circuit for mine). Has "bad transformer" spraypainted on top, because somebody couldn't bother testing the current setting potentiometer before consigning it to the surplus sale. The HF arc starter is fun to look at too:  Better inside pic:  Thing weighs half a ton, but it does work, and $425 beats the hell out of the $2k for a new Miller. It came with a busted water cooler for the torch and some other crap I'm still sorting through, like ~5 packs of tungstens that were Navy surplus from Korea ('48 production date), and some "Eutectic Staintrode" stick electrodes. I finally got a stinger hooked up so I can do heavy steel now that I'm ~99% out of argon. Next task: rebuild the "cart" it came with (note, that orange strap is the only thing holding the cart together).
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Mar 21, 2011 03:21
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Iskariot posted:What you mean is: Someone should get a Dr. Doom welding mask! I already have a mask with flames on the side :P And it's actually single phase, but it can draw 102A at 240V single phase, a mere 50A if you somehow manage 460V single phase. AbsentMindedWelder posted:That's a great machine. The only features newer TIG machines have that are nice vs old ones are square waves and lower power consumption. That all being said, they were welding with sine waves for a long time successfully, and you're going to be very happy with it once you get a good TIG torch hooked up to it. It's pretty good, and it came with a real weldcraft WP-18 torch, which I just cleaned up and put new collet/body/tungsten in and it works fine. Just have to get the water cooler set up before I do any big stuff. It has a switch for arc start, will do continuous or start only (or off, for stick welding). It weighs 965lbs according to the manual I found. After pushing it off the trailer, I believe it. Nice mill, I'd love to have the space for some real machine tools.
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Mar 21, 2011 13:01
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AbsentMindedWelder posted:I have the same torch... I personally wouldn't run it all without coolant. Dunno if your cooler is fixable or not, but eBay is a good place to buy them. Until you get a cooler running, you can get a garden hose and hook the torch up to your city water supply. My cooler is "fixed" right now; I used the TIG to braze up the blown tubes in its radiator. Just need to fix the welders aux power output (fuse holder busted) and wire it up properly, and find some new tubing, the old stuff is pretty rotten. What sort of coolant should I run? I'm thinking straight water for right now, maybe with some antifreeze added to lube the pump and prevent it from freezing. Still looking to replace it at some point, but I'll survive with this one for now. I used the torch at ~40A for ~30min to braze up the copper tubes; it got warmish, but nothing like the air-cooled torch I had on my HF brand DC inverter. Need to get off my rear end and get my oxy-acetylene setup over to the new shop so I can cut up the cart and actually weld it together properly unlike the dumbass that built it. 2x4s and plumbers strap are not a suitable substitute for welded steel. Doubly so when supporting a half-ton welder.
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Mar 21, 2011 19:41
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Jet Ready Go posted:I am planning to do some arts and crafts work with thick plastics (anywhere from 1cm thick and down), possibly some wood (the arts and crafty kind, not chunks of wood meant to make log cabins) and very little (if any) metal work. Honestly, for straight cuts in plexiglass/acrylic/PVC, I've found a standard hacksaw or jigsaw with 32TPI metal-cutting blade to work just fine. Edit: if you do want a rotary tool (nothing beats them for shaping stuff, IMO), get the dremel that fits your budget. This is not something that Harbor Freight makes well.
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Mar 22, 2011 03:58
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ExplodingSims posted:So, I found this guy selling a 60 gallon air compressor for $100, and he just slashed it down to $75. Now, I guess he replaced the original motor with something smaller, and it would need a larger one to get back to full power. So any ideas how hard/expensive would it be to get a motor and install it on this? Any good recommendations for a motor while we're at it. It'd be pretty simple to swap motors (3 wire nuts, 4 bolts, and 1-2 belts to drive the compressor), but finding an appropriate motor that will work with your electric service (do you have a dedicated 220V circuit for it?) may be a bit harder. A 5hp motor should draw ~25A @220V, so you'd need at least a 30-40A breaker and wire.
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Oct 12, 2011 15:38
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