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Charging battery with welder

F

fixerupper

Well-known Member
How many of you guys have charged a battery with a welder? My former harvest boss and I were remenicing today which gets humorous at times. We were remembering the time one of the guys on the crew tried charging the battery in the 94 chevy pickup with the portable welder claiming he had done it before. He hooked up the cables and fired up the welder not noticing the welder was turned all the way up, probably to 240 amps. Pretty soon the battery was steaming and everyone was backing away from it. Finally I came on the scene and turned the welder off. After the battery cooled the pickup started OK but the ecm was messed up. I've never seen this mentioned on this site but maybe I've forgotten about it.
 
Portable welders are in the neighborhood of 80 volts OCV. Don't see how that would damage a PCM. However, my Dad used to carry around a Hobart G-250 to start the Tournapulls in the '50s. He couldn't afford the batteries. Those HRBB Cummins's didn't start very hard anyway.
 
If it is a DC WELDER and you have it on the lowest possible setting
possible. Also you better have the ground cable unhooked. I would say
about one maybe two minutes max. Would anyone else like to try this?
 
I have a old Forney welder that has a battery charger you plug into the welding leads, they also used to use a welder here to thaw out frozen pipes lol
 
My Dads old century welder has an add charger that plugged into the rod and ground ports. Had 6, 12, and 24 volt settings. I never seen him use it though I tried it out a few years ago and worked fine just thought it seems like a waste of electricity using 240 welder to charge battery maybe not. Was a century product. And yes, not really using a welder to charge a battery like stated, just thought I would mention it. chris
 
I've done it a number of times. With a
portable that has hookups for wire
welding.

They are constant voltage on those
connections, low is usually 13-14V.
Yes you need to be on DC and have the
correct polarity.

I wouldn't do it just for charging,
but makes a good booster pack.
 
Done it set on D.C. And that wind the sob over .
Learned it from our old farm mechanic working on
natural gas engines he'd hook the welder to one of
those hard starting pigs and that would bring er to
life
 
when I was a younger my dad and uncle had an oil cooled welder back in England that had a setting on it for battery charging. It was either made by
oxford or another company Dad can't remember it was over 30 years ago now.
Regards Robert
 
My 1936 Lincoln tombstone has specific ports in the front for charging
batteries. 6V batteries that is. Plug the cables in, hook them to the
battery and go. Those ports on the bottom right of the green panel.
Blow the picture up. They're labeled.

That's also how you adjust the welder.
Unplug the cables and move them to a different hole.
Amazingly, I still have the original manual for the welder too.
That's how I know the year. It is both AC and DC.
I like it much better than my newer AC only tombstone.

4284.jpg
 
Stick welders are "constant current". So they really have no voltage regulation. Hooking one up to a vehicle battery for longer than it takes to jump-start is asking for trouble, particularly on newer vehicles loaded with electronics.
 
I have an old Forney farm welder that has plugs for charging a battery. The welder is an AC unit so the battery connections must have a rectifier. I've never looked
 
used to haul rock out of a private gravel pit.
owner had a 977 cat loader parked next to a shed with a gas welder in it.
Hook up the welder to the 8D battery under the seat, get off fire the welder up, get back on and fire it up, get off turn off the welder, get back on unhook the welder, get off put away the leads.

it didn't turn left ,go into the bank get a bucket full, back up, get off get into the truck back up, get on the loader dump bucket, get off , drive truck forward, get on loader go into bank get a bucket full back up........ long days
 
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