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Hi,ntmcj I have a Hobart Stickmate AC/DC which I bought new and a Lincoln AC buzzbox which I bought used. At one of the locations where I weld, my power supply is a dryer outlet on a 30 Amp breaker. Except at its lowest settings, the Lincoln will trip the breaker. The Hobart doesn't. At an outlet on a 50 Amp breaker, the machines work equally well at all settings. Lincoln buzz boxes have fixed settings, the Stickmate has a dial. Fixed settings are less flexible but more secure--they won't start to creep as the machine gets older, as dial settings can. Lincoln claims a 20% duty cycle at every setting. The Stickmate duty cycle increases as the amperage setting is reduced. The duty cycle is 100% at 100 Amps AC and 65 Amps DC. The Lincoln's actual duty cycle is probably closer to 100% at every setting, and the Hobart's may be too, for all I know. These are reputable companies, likely to err on the side of caution in their claims. Lincoln's AC/DC version of my welder puts out 225A and 125A, respectively. The Hobart puts out 235 and 160. At the shop where I do most of my welding I sometimes use more than 125 Amps of DC current for surfacing, but I haven't yet built anything where I needed more than 125A DC. As for AC versus DC, I think AC is underrated. If I only had an AC welder, I'd get by just fine. Use 6011 instead of 6010, and 6013 or 7014 in place of 7018, and it will be a long, long time before you're too good for the equipment. All the best, Stan
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