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I am familiar with arc welding and with mig welding but I have no knowledge about inverter technology. Is it the same as TIG?
does it have an application in the home shop?
bobby.
Inverter technology is just a very efficient method of converting an A/C sinewave input into DC or a true generated A/C squarewave output that is controlable.
The main advantage of a welder, or a plasma cutter that uses inverter technology is a lower input current requirement but you do pay a price.
Most people also think repairing a broken inverter machine costs a lot more, but in fact it's cheaper to fix them than transformer machines.
Another advantage is weight, as 3 phase says they are more efficient allowing you to use less current (Important if you are welding on a 115V 20 amp circuit or intend to weld somewhere that doesn't have a good 220V "Dryer" or "Stove" circuit), they are also very light. A fully capable inverter Tig machine will come in under 50lbs...while an equivalent transformer machine may weigh in the hundreds of pounds.
Yup.. Inverters are small and light... I have a new transformer based TIG machine (Syncrowave 250DX / 310 Amp output) and it weights in around 400 lbs and Requires a dedicated 100AMP 230v circuit... The inverter version I think only needs 30-40 amps and weights around 80 lbs.
Thanks guys.
Does the arc have to have gas shielding or can it get along with cored wire like a dry MIG?
I want to weld stainless steel sheeting in various shapes. Gear around the winery shutes and tanks kind of stuff.
Feel that I should progress from arc welding with stainless rods. My little MIG got knocked off in a recent break in to our premises.
We have single phase power that gets tired sometimes. ie drops to 215v.
any advice on subject appreciated.
Bobby.
Bobby -
I've got a cheap little 135A MIG box that I use with tri-gas. (I think it's Ar-He-N mixed, I forget the ratios) Although I've done flux-cored wire welding, my setup is indoors in my basement, so I prefer using tri-gas because it doesn't set off the smoke detectors. It's just cleaner. And it'll weld stainless quite well - it can even make my welding look ok. Also a lot easier to clean up. I use the bottom half of a shopping cart for my welding cart - it's cheap (well, free actually) and it's plenty sturdy.
I don't recall seeing an inverter-based MIG machine, but certainly there must be one somewhere. Like 3phase said, that would have the advantage of being much lighter. Of course, if you use gas, you still have the tank to haul around...
Thanks wirecutter,
Our winery is pretty small so we are not on production budgets. I guess I will stick to MIG as the thieves who broke in did not take the bottle of Argon and regulator with the minimig.
do you have any limitations in the thickness of ss plate you can weld with your MIG.For example if the machine can weld 3/8"steel plate will it only do 3/16"ss sheet?
Regards, bobby.
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