Jerry/MT
Elite Member
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2008
- Messages
- 3,135
- Location
- North Idaho-The Palouse
- Tractor
- New Holland TD95D, Ford 4610 & Kubota M4500
at the youthful age of 62, I want to learn how to weld. I've read the comments about a class at the local vo-tech, and I'm hunting that down.
I prefer buying older equipment and renovating them, and much of what I'm buying is dinged or dented, and more relevantly, cracked in places. Steel or iron only, no aluminum, just repair work. Seems the standard stick welder makes sense here and a good place to start. Tig, Mig, Stick, Hybrid, lot of options here. I've reread the Northern Tools catalog until I'm blue in the face and still am unsure. I know I need to practice no matter what, but I have to buy a machine to do that, so what to buy? $500-800 budget, so nothing too fancy or powerful. And I really don't want a Harbor Freight welder....
And my power is only 110-20 amps for now, so that limits what I can get.
I know this is a wide open question, but would appreciate your comments as to a good first general purpose welder, to fix farm/garden equipment. Thanks
Drew
You're never too old to learn so go take that welding course! I'm looking to take a refreher course but they're kinda' hard to find where I live.
You'll learn to weld with gas, stick, mig, and tig etc. Then you can decide what welder meets your needs. That's what I did back in 1989.
After I finished the course, I quizzed the instructor and other professional welders and ended up buying a Lincoln 225/125 AC/DC stick welder and I've used that here on the ranch to fab stuff and repair equipment. You can often find AC stick machines on ebay and craigslist pretty cheap. The smaller AC/DC stick machines like my old Lincoln are tougher to find used. They are not that expensive to buy new but depending on what you need to do for the same $'s you can buy a used AC/DC stick machine with more capability.
I recently found a Miller DialArc250P AC/DC machine and got a screamin' deal on it with 50 ft leads and 75 pounds of rod for $250. The PO bought a wire feed machine and didn't use the big Miller anymore. I sold the old Lincoln for $400 to a beginning welder who just finished a beginning welding course. Life's a circle!
So go take a welding course and then decide what type of welding you want to do and that will dictate the type of welder you'll buy. Good luck.