Thinking about a mig welder?

My 16 year old son would like a mig welder for in the shop. He likes to build stuff and is good with the stick welder. Should we buy a used Miller or a new cheaper Lincoln or Hobart. We do want gas. I do not have alot of money to spend but do not want to go to cheap either. I guess most of what we would do is 3/8 or less. What do you have and what would you recommend? What brand and what models? Thanks Tom

I've had a Hobart 120 Handler for years and years. Very reliable. Its the only one I've owned so can't comment on any others.

At SCSU we have had several mig brands. we have made a commitment to Miller in the last few years. Service life and Inverter electronics technology are major advantages. 130 to 150 amp range are plenty. Jim

We have a Lincoln weld pack 155 dad bought at Central tractor which is now tsc. Has to be from the early 90's. Has been used quite a lot with no issues. A buddy just bought a Hobart from tsc I think it's a 185 or close to that. Was kinda pricey I thought. Around 700 I think. Seems good so far but it's new. We have Miller's at work and they seem to be good too but they are much bigger welders. I guess what you have to figure out is if you need a larger welder with a higher duty cycle or if a smaller unit will work for you. 3/8 is starting to get thick for some of the smaller ones without using multiple passes. If it were me I would look for a good used miller or Lincoln that's a little bigger than I needed. If you buy a smaller one you might end up regretting it down the road. After all the welders I have used I still like my Lincoln link welder 180k made in the 50's. Ac welder only but still welds like a dream.

I started with a Hobart Handler and it was good.I wore it out and bought a Lincoln 150 and it was a piece of junk. It had nylon gears and they were always broke. It was almost useless. I sold it and bought a new Miller 180 and it was a good welder. Later I found a good buy on a Miller 251, and it was been great. I don't need that much amperage usually, but some reserve is nice.

I don't know what your budget is but an ESAB welder can do Stick Mig And Tig all in one unit. you can look at them on Amozon. It has Auto program in it you put in the type and thickness of the metal and it ready to weld. It is a very good welder and easy to use.

I have a Millermatic 200 and I like it a lot, I use it on some heavy stuff..

Tom, we have had a lincoln MIG since 2000, it has been very good. I am not sure the model number, I'll have to look at it in the shop tomorrow.

I sprung for a new Hobart Handler 140 a few months ago. Got it on sale at TSC for $469. I haven't used it that much yet, but I've been pleased with it so far.

I bought it to replace a Clarke that had constant feed problems. Since I already had a gas bottle on the Clarke, I just replaced the Clarke on the cart with the Hobart and hooked the gas up right away.

Used a Hobart Handler 190 for the last 15yrs and love it! Looking to upgrade to to the 210 here pretty quick. Have had 0 issues with it. I used the shielded wire with no gas in the beginning, and it works alright but I would recommend just getting the gas. A Hobart should come with everything needed to run gas and it just makes things alot nicer!

Miller.....and the biggest you can justify dollar wise. A 180 is a good "little" welder. 220 volt and co2 shieldgas.

I have had a Lincoln SP100 110V for 25 years. Never had any probems with it, and I do a good amount of fabricateing. It welds steel 3/8" and down very nicely. I also have my grandfathers Lincoln Tombstone stick welder for the heavy welding.
Loren

My friend was in the exact same situation as you. One of the local Gas/Welder supply houses has a yearly one day sale. He picked up a Miller at that sale. My point is talk to your supply houses and see if there are any sales coming. Paul

I agree with the "Miller" guys. Mine has been great through the years. 130-150 with argon/co2. should be able to get one if you shop for $500-$600. They may even be cheaper now than when I got mine. Stay away from the "box store" even tho they have the "brand name". Take that model number to the welding supply house and see if they even list it in their books...they will tell ya what the deal is. Far as I know box stores don't yet carry Miller...Miller knows where that ends.

My suggestion wouod be to go with the Lincoln. Especially in the smaller welders they are the best there is. The Hobart is now owned by Miller and is their bargain brand. I've never tried a Hobart, but have compared the lincoln and millers and in my opinion the lincoln is a better welder, at least in the small ones.

Consider a Tweeco if you have an AirGas dealer nearby. I'm not a welder but I've heard good things about them.

Buy the best 220 volt machine you can afford. Do NOT even consider a 110V machine. I've welded professionally with Hobart Fabstar 4030;Lincoln,and Miller.Even used an old('dinosaur')Union Carbide(the best of the bunch,too.). All were good. Get as high a duty cycle as you can.Anything less will be a disapointment.Ive tried a 110,and a cheaper 220 machine for personal use at home. Been sorry with both.In this case,you get what you pay for.

I have a Millermatic 211 and a Spoolmatic 100 I use for aluminium. They work fine for me. John

I meant Spoolmate 100.

i have to laugh a little...the original question was which mig welder...thats kinda like asking, blonde, brunette, or redhead...or Deere vs anything else....or ford, gm, or dodge. I am no expert, but ive welded with miller, lincoln, hobart, & esab's.

Currently i have an older hobart handler 180/185 (?) which has done a LOT of work and been very trouble free, very straight forward in the settings and it has a tweeco gun with all off the shelf consumables.

In my area esab parts are getting very hard to find and i am close to a Praxair, i have been needing a larger MIG and i think i may just spring for the welder Praxair is building. Its been out for a few years now and doesnt seem to show any signs of folding. Guys at praxair are making it very difficult not to give it a go and its coming in a couple hundred bucks cheaper than their counter parts.

Price a new one of whatever model you think you would like then spend a month watching craigs or local auctions...to me it always seemed like a higher resale value a better machine....

All just observations, let us know what you get, i would be interested in hearing what you got and how you like it.

Any 220V MIG welder will handle 3/8" steel. Obviously the more you spend the better the machine. If you're only going to do occasional small repairs, one of the cheaper sub-200 amp units will be fine. But if you want to do fabrication of 1/4 inch steel, the limited duty cycle of the smaller units will drive you nuts. Nothing more aggravating than having to stop in the middle of a job and wait a few minutes for the welder to cool off because you threw the thermal switch.

Buy the biggest you can with the money you have to spend.

You always end up finding alot more jobs to weld than what you had in mind

I have a 220v Lincoln 180 with gas and it does a good job for the variety of jobs I use it on

Your budget is usually the deciding factor

(quoted from post at 18:33:09 11/20/16) I have had a Lincoln SP100 110V for 25 years. Never had any probems with it, and I do a good amount of fabricateing. It welds steel 3/8" and down very nicely. I also have my grandfathers Lincoln Tombstone stick welder for the heavy welding.
Loren

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That is what I have except have a miller 225 'Thunderbolt' with a high frequency unit instead of the 'Tombstone'. It's been a good combination for a lot of years. 8)

I am a Miller fan. I bought a used Miller 210. First the liner made the wire stick and that was annoying. Replaced liner for feed tube. Then I wanted to run .023 wire and bought new roller only to find there already was a .023 groove in the roller .035 one side --.023 the other. Then the .023 wire would bird nest, Switched back to .035 and no bird nests. This welder looked clean and new when I got it but it was from a fiberglass Corvette shop so I believe it had a lot of wear on moving parts. So point is even if you buy a new looking used Miller you may have to play around a bit to get everything right. [ Also Miller does not own Hobart -- they are both owned by a parent company]

I have a Hobart Ironman 230 I got from a farm and home store. Very good machine for the money.

Like some of the others have said, but the biggest one you can afford. I have used Miller, Hobart, Esab and Lincoln and like them all. I prefer 220 volt machines. I have used 110 volt machines and they are ok for some stuff, but can be a little low on power and the control is very limited on the less expensive models. The newer ones are better than the older ones were for sure with better control settings.
Whatever you do, do not buy a Century. They are really affordable, but are not very durable. I bought a new 225 amp machine back in the day off of the Matco tool truck. It had the Matco name on it, but was a real oddball when it came to parts and was made by Century. Mack, Matco, Snap-on, Cornwell all are or were in the day built by Century and re-branded for their tool line. Parts were a pain to get and it broke down often. After three control boards and one transformer I gave up on it and bought a Lincoln 350MP industrial machine. Love it. Super smooth and really nice control of your work.
The big box stores have some common names like Lincoln and Hobart, but they are not the same machine you would get at the welding store. They are a price point machine and not very heavy duty. If your work is limited to small repairs a little fab work they are probably fine, but work them hard and the difference is noticeable pretty quick. Parts for them may be hard to get from your local welding supply store because they are not going to be in their catalog. Loose a control board and it may be many weeks before you get one. Same with drive rolls and tips. The gun may say Tweco, but the parts for the gun may be really oddball stuff built for re-branding. For my old Matco machine I couldn't find a Tweco tip to fit the gun. I ended up using a Lincoln tip that was way too long and cutting it down to fit.
If you have time and the patients to shop around and shop used machines there are some really good deals out there. The Lincoln I have now was a demo machine I bought from the local welding dealer. I ended up with a basically new industrial machine that was a year old for two thirds the price of a new one and a warranty good for a year. The warranty on a new Lincoln of that model is five years, but for the cost savings I am likely going to come out ok on it. It looks new and I have no reason to believe it was beat on. It literally didn't have but one scratch on it and they put a new leash and gun on it for me because I wanted a 15 foot leash. Not a bad deal.

Greg