[coolngroovy]

There are a couple of reasons for that.
Firstly....wire tension is too tight. Remove the gun from the wirefeeder. If your machine has an 'inch' button, you should be able to feed just enough wire out, to be able to hang on to it with a pair of pliers. Hit the inch button.....wire should gently push the wire away without 'bird caging'. If it still bird cages, release some of the wire tention. If the wire slips on the rollers....then wind some more tention on. Correct tension is now set.

Perfect opportunity to squirt some white spirits down the gun liner & reverse blow with air. Remove the diffuser & tip to do this.

Ok....liner is clean, tension is good....check the guides for excessive wear..only thing left to do is replace with a new tip & merrily weld away.

Something to watch....if you get a arc spot inside the tip, it's difficult to pick up. Even though the tip may look new, it can cause the same problem.

Cheers, Col.