What TIG Welder?
 

You guys who have TIG welders, what do you use?

I'm taking a TIG welding class and thinking about getting a TIG welder someday. Ideally my buddy and I could share one, i.e. the welder would ideally be reasonably portable so we could cart it between our respective places. He is mostly interested in welding mild steel for decorative projects (he's into glassblowing). I am mostly interested in welding car stuff - like, when and if I ever decide to turbo my car and need to weld stainless for headers and aluminium for the intercooler. Neither of us are interested in welding really thick metal, or long periods of continuous welding. He's already got a stick welder and an gas welder should we want to build a bridge someday.

We are trying to figure out what brand, how big, and what features we should be looking for. At the class we are using Miller Syncrowave 250 welders which seem plenty beefy but also plenty expensive and bulky. I think we want AC (for the aluminium) but do we want water-cooling, 250 amps, etc?

Browsing the web, I see so many TIG welders that I am at a loss.

Miller Econotig

When I took welding classes, the school also had Miller Syncrowave machines.

When asked about buying welding equipment, our instructor said: "You buy welders by the pound."

What he meant of course, is the best quality machines have rugged (copper wound) transformers etc. for long life under high duty cycles.

Water cooling is a must for any TIG machine other than the very lightest duty.

John,

My new TIG machine just arrived today. I haven't used it yet, but it has a pretty good reputation. I got the Miller Synchrowave 180 SD. I picked this one over the Lincoln 175 Pro for a few reasons. I bought this because I am to the point now where I have to weld some aluminum so the AC with "square wave" technology was important. From the looks of it, I think I will be pretty happy, it has digital readouts for volts and amps, an adjustable post weld flow and it comes very complete (regulator, torch, foot pedal and stick lead). It's got a small "footprint" and only weighs a bit over 200#.

I got it from www.cyberweld.com and it was almost $500 cheaper than the local shops with free shipping (took about a week). I am not completely sold on the water cooled torch just yet, but I will let you know how that goes. BTW even though the Lincoln was a few bucks cheaper, it didn't come with a balance control and the duty cycle was rated at 25% vs the Millers at 40%.

Pete

Not a TIG, but, for a home shop welder, I would buy the Lincoln 220v model that has infinite controls for both feed and voltage. Sorry, don't have the exact model #, but it's about $100 more than the next one down. You can overcome the lack of infinite voltage control with technique, but why? If you want to weld in all positions and do it well, you need good equipment. after that, it's all in the duty cycle, me thinks. I'm not a production shop, so I can get away with 25% duty cycle.

BTW, the TIG is a must tool for the pro or aspiring pro. My next step. Of course, by then you will be thinking of plasma cutters, etc.