Lincoln Weld Pack 115 wire welder

Thor

Nope I disagree with the salesman as a 115v Mig machine doesn't have enough amps to weld 1/4" metal in one pass. Good for about 3/32" thick material.

Lincoln machine numbers now have no relanship to there "true" amperage rating. A SP135T has a rating of 90a/18v/20% duty cycle to be useful. Yes at some point the machince can putout 135a but for only a very short time and under ideal conditions thats not really useful for a home shop wanting to weld 1/4" material.

In Mig machines, any amperage rating less than 200amps/20% duty cycle, is just a waste of time for typical home shop use.

T_Bone

Mike

Will it weld 1/4". Certainly. One pass. Probably not. But I"m not in a big rush. I like my Weld Pac. It handy and does what I need done.

Bob

Yes the machines do have a niche in the shop for lite gauge welding. I've had one for the past 15yrs and it does well for what I bought it for, 16ga material but if I was going to buy again, I would choose a machine rated at 200a/20% duty cycle as it will weld more materials.

A person is buying a Mig machine to make continous welds. At 90a/20%DC your very limited on the amount of welding time, 2min out of 10min therefor short welds and small beads.

However a 200a/20%DC machine is rated at 150a/60%DC. At a 60% duty cycle and 150a, it's very easy to make a 1/4" single pass weld for 6min out of 10min with long welds and medium to heavy bead width.

The first 3/8" to 1/2" of Mig welds have cold lapp and need to be ground out before the weld can continue and be a quality weld.

I've written several articles on welding on this website and one that tells of how to test for a sound weld. See the link below.

I believe that if most Mig weldors would preform a simple weld test, they would find alot of there good looking Mig welds would fail.

T_Bone

• Weld Testing

A year or so ago I searched for and found the meaning of some of the welding terms you used. For my purposes a review of the video included with the welder the few times a year I use the machine is adequate. FWIW, with no background using a wire feed and probably less that 5 hours experience, I butt welded a couple pieces of 3/16" flat stock, let it cool and then put it in a vice and tried to break the weld. The stock bent but the weld didn"t break. Since then I have on occasion ground out a weld to see how well I"m doing.

I"ll agree with anyone that these small welders have a limit of 1/4". Yet, I remain firm in my conviction that for a "non welder" these are very useful tools.

Bob