90 amp mig welder at h.f.

Im am pretty familiar with the stick welder.. Not a pro by any means but can get the job done.. NOW I want to start replacing some rust panels with new panels on a couple trucks.. looked at H.F. at the mig welder they have for like 111.00.. Would this be o.k for me as a novice to use??

I strongly recommend not getting the one fro HF I have personally bought three of them an none of them lasted more then an hour of light spot welding on sheet metal an everytime I returned it they tried to blame me for it's failure northern tool sells one equally priced but has held up for a number of years now

I was just like you with my first mig welder and I can tell you this from my own usage, Spend a little more money and buy a good welder to start with. You will not be happy with a HF welder at all! There are lots of used 110v Miller, Hobart and Lincoln mig welders out there for sale. I bought a new 85 amp Century 110v welder new and it would not do what I wanted it to do and I got mad at it and it sit there. I used a Miller 135 at work and could weld good with it but could not weld crap with the Century. I sold the Century and bought a Miller. Do yourself a favor and buy a good welder the first time and you will be much happier! BTDT! Bandit

First mig = with shielding gas welding. That $111 welder you are looking at is flux core only so it is not a mig unit. (Any mig capable welder can run flux core but a flux core only welder is flux core only).

Additionally, all flux core wire (or mig wire for that matter)made from any manufacturer Requires DC output on the welder as wire feeding is inherent in nature to be a DC only process.

Guess what output that HF crapbox you are looking at outputs. Sadly, it outputs AC which is not suited for any wire feeding process. Should be illegal to sell those things, but lots of fools buy em cause they think they are getting a deal. (Just to be clear there is nothing wrong with an AC output stick welder as there are some stick rods made designed to run on AC).

There are some cheap wire feeders out there for not much more money. Look at the label on the welder and make sure it outputs DC. Also, flux core is not really well suited for body work. The flux is impossible to clean and will bubble your paint. Plus flux core can not weld as thin of metal anyway as mig mode so problem is 2-fold.

Long story short, buy a low cost mig welder that outputs DC. (You can still run flux core in it if you choose). Regardless skip the wasting of the $90 to $110 on a doorstop that is impossible to buy wire for.

I bought one of the HF welders years ago because I thought I needed a mig welder for some body work.

To make a long story short it was a lesson in buying junk. I does work half-arse. the flux core wire is high priced and they have a lot of splatter.

if you need a mig spend the money and buy a real mig welder that uses shielding gas.

You will be glad you did.

I bought one of pos junk things several years ago.Pd 150 bucks for it.Welded for a total of maybe 10 minutes.Later sold it at a yard sale for 50 bucks.