Cheap Welders

I've been looking at the Miller 175 for a long time, but just don't want to spend that much right now and don't have a 230 outlet anyways. So, I need some kind of welder to get my Jeep on the road and I'm looking at cheap ones that I can use for a year or two. I've never welded and it's all new to me. 3/16" is the heaviest I need to weld for now.

Harbor freight has one for $130 (http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=44567). 90-amp, says it uses self-shielding wire and doesn't require gas. I doubt it's as good as welding with gas, but what is the difference? Do you get a stronger weld with gas, or just nicer looking, or what?

Wal-Mart has a Campbell Hausfeld 80-amp welder for $260 that claims to do 3/16" steel and it comes with a regulator and hose so you can use gas with it if you want.

I realize the above welders aren't the "best" and all that, but will they produce a strong weld on 3/16" stuff until I have the means to get something better? Are there other good ones you guys are familiar with that are still REALLY cheap, as in $250 or less?

Feel free to share any opinions or school me on welding stuff.
TIA.

I´m not familiar with every manufacturer out there. I bought a Home Depot wire welder (175 AMP) 220 volt. It is the same welder, made under contract for Home Depot, but under another name ($100 bucks cheaper), the internals are identical, the name and color are different. Guarantee ?, parts, right around the corner. Sears welders are often also a good bet.
Look at the internals, how does the roll go on, what kind of brake (tensioner). Wire feed wheel, metal or plastic (doesn´t last long), tensioner for the wire feed wheel. Is the feed wheel reversable for different size wire? Can you install teflon inserts in the feed hose (for non magnetic materials). Can you install the gun and bigger tip from the 225? On 3/16 metal the small tip/sleeve will wear out pretty fast.
On my 175, I mostly use the center of the dial, a smaller welder would probably work for most of my small jobs. But I´d probably be running it continiously, at the outer edge of it´s design envelope. I´ve had my 175 for about 15 years now.
I´ve welded/soldiered, for decades with a variety of fluxes. Which screwed me up pretty good, on occasion, prolonged use can mess you up.
C02 gas is cheap and works, mostly just as well as Argon mixes. For fastening welds/sheet metal, C02. Load carrying welds, require the good stuff. More a question of metalergy, than strength or the quality of the weld. Straight C02 makes a hard, sometimes brittle weld and dirties up the tips faster.
I´ve seen combo welders, that work 110 volt to the middle of the dial and the 220 Volts for the thicker stuff. I seem to do the vast majority of my welding, around 100 Amps or so, one step past the middle on a 175.
I´ve also have a shop welder that has to moved with a fork lift.
I rarley use my acytelin tanks anymore, my rod welder is mostly a door stop. It´s easier to weld small stasinless steel jobs with the wire welder, than setting up the speciality welders. It´s all around, my welder of choice.

"I seem to do the vast majority of my welding, around 100 Amps or so, one step past the middle on a 175."


What thickness of metal do you usually weld when you're at that setting?

You have to kind of tailor the weld to the job. 100 Amps or less will get a pretty good burn (deep weld) up to and beyond 1/8" material. I´ve welded up the 1/4" or so at that setting. You can slow down the wire feed a bit, weld a little slower and get a good weld, with thicker material. There are also tricks, thicker material can be slightly beveled (with a hand grinder)and multiple passes can be made. A smaller wire burns hotter, multiple passes with a small hot bead. To much heat can cause problems, metal warps, even thick metal. Things you pick up through experience.
I have one setup just for portabilty, a 175 that I can load into a truck by myself and a 10 Amp diesel generator (220V) that I weld farm machinery with in the field. Much more than half dial, blows the circuit breaker.
Load bearing welds, that carry something are another story. Usually over engineered around 50-100%, hard to do when your working at your machines limits.
But there are tricks to this also, multiple passes and gussets are just as strong as a single or two pass weld, often stronger. Just add some material and bracing.
I´ve been doing this stuff for so long, I don´t even think about the thickness of the material, just look at it, set the knobs and go. If it´s to much, for the small welder, hall it back to the shop and use the big one. You can tell pretty quick when a weld is cold, material piles up and the edges are rounded.
Much of the automotive stuff, is at pretty low amps, sheet metal and stuff, thinner material is harder to weld than thicker material.
I often use the small machine to build a construction (spot weld) then fire up the bigun for the final welds. Cutting something to form, spot welding it together and hauling it to the welding shop, is no big deal and not expensive. Most of the cost is man hours and fabrication. Welders mantra, it ain´t gotta look pretty, but it´s gotta hold.

The main reason I have to get a welder soon is because I busted off the forward spring hanger nut for the rear leaf springs. I'm grinding down a 7/8" thick piece of steel to a trapezoid shape that will fit exactly in a hole that I cut in the bottom of that pocket outside of the frame. I will drill and tap the chunk to accept the spring hanger bolt, so it will bear some load. I'll be welding the chunk to the pocket metal which is probably 1/8" or so. If I can get by with a junker $130 90-amp welder, I'll do that. If not, I'll probably get the Miller 135, which is the most powerful I could get running on a 115V, which is all I have available. I'm just going back and forth trying to decide if the cheapee will do the job or not because the money has other places to go. Thanks for all the information so far.

A miller 135 won't touch a 7/8" chunk of steel...Not to mention you need to have something like that welded by someone who really knows how to weld. It will take you a year or longer to learn how to weld well enough to weld a 7/8" chunk of steel to 1/8" sheet metal without screwing it up really bad. That year is assuming you spend a lot of time practicing and have some natural ability. Pay someone to weld it.


Good Luck,
JJ

The 7/8" chunk is basically an oversized nut to replace the original, the 1/8" is the bracketry all around the 7/8" chunk. Does that make a difference?

Welding wildly different sizes in material, requires technique. You have to somewhat get the larger piece hotter than the thinner piece, some is tip technique and some it high temp. and learning how not to burn through the thinner material.
JJ13 is probably right, not for the novice. Your plan anyway.

Strength isn´t achieved by thickness, the weld/construction is only as stong as the weakest point. Usually right at the outside edge of the weld.
Put in another layer to match the hight of the spring bracket (where it meets the frame), with a nut welded to the back (drill through the frame with an antena drill to pass the nut), maybe drill a few holes, to weld the frame and the bracket patch together.
Then have the local sheet metal shop bend you an L shaped bracket or like a double L kinda like a Z. Drill a hole to match the inner nut and weld another nut on the outside.
You´d end up with layers, with a few holes drilled (through one piece) to weld them together (like spot welds) then some edge welds. Weld the biggest nuts (hardened; high carbon) you can find to the finished construction. The spring bolt is a special hardened bolt, if the nuts arn´t up to the job, your wasting your time. You may have to hunt up a longer spring bolt, usually stamped with a diamond sign, to indicate hardness.
You´d end up with two nuts (index the nuts with a bolt before welding) welded to two different layers. Two overlapping layers, spot welded , are much stronger than butt welds or edge welds.

If you hadn´t already ground down the bracket, I´d do it a whole other way.

Get an antena drill and drill into the frame from the top, put some kind of rust inhibitor in the frame.

Make sure everything is clean, clean, clean before you ever start, bare metal.

Hope I´ve helped, if my instructions suck, I can try again.

I don't understand your idea completely, but I get the gist. Any chance of making a small drawing and scanning it? I've almost got the chunk ground down to specs, then I'd just have to drill and tap it, but now I'm a little worried about how hard the steel is that I'm drilling and tapping compared to the bolt that it will take.

The yellow part is the part I cut out and where I'm planning on sliding the chunk up in there. The blue are holes that I would drill so I can make a small rosette weld on each side. The red is where I'm planning on welding. What if I drilled a hole big enough and then ground it to the right shape to accept a nut? Or can you explain your idea some more 8mud?

I tried scanning a diagram in, but it got scrambled, some way or the other. I´d pictured, that you´d ground off the entire raised area of the old spring mount, not just the bottom.
I was concerned with the hardness off the piece you are going to weld in there. The hardness of the bolt is mostly for, up down stresses, but who knows. Simple test, take a sharp punch, punch a dimple, in the steel you are planning on using, using about the same force, punch a grade five bolt (pretty mild) (in a bench vise). You´ll get an idea of the hardness of the metal your working with (not very hard). I rarley trust any load bearing construction, to one set of welds or threads (especially if it moves). Welding nuts messes with the temper also.
How about using a piece of steel (some thinner than you´d planned), drilled/threaded, with a nut welded to it, to the same thickness as the inside of the brace. With a slide hammer pull the brace out a bit, to clear the nut and your flat stock. Slide it up in there and hammer down the bracket until it contacts the nut (drill a hole in the bracket that will just pass the nut), spot weld the nut to the braket, the flat stock to the braket through say 6-9, 5/16 inch holes. At the bottom weld the flat stock to the brace (add some metal if you have to) and the frame.
Redundancy, if something starts to give, it will give in stages. Stretch, tear and crack well before it falls apart completely. Trusting one set of threads or welds, isn´t the way I do things.
If your gonna use a single block, have it tempered and weld it in many places at least eight points. At least a couple of 1/2" welds to the frame, just for insurance. A good technique to keep from messing with the temper more than necessary, is to use a window pump sparayer and mist the work while welding, keeps the heat localized and helps preserve the temper somewhat.

You can save money on buying your welder by going to garage sales I got mine for $75.00 and put a plug on it so that it would plug into where the clothes dryer plugs in.

Yesterday was my day off, so I ground down the entire chunk of metal so it fits perfectly. It's very snug. I have to hammer it to get it up in there, but I left a lot of length below so that I could get it back out. Anyways, I hammered it up in there and marked where the hole needed to be, then took it to the local spring shop and had the hole drilled so that it is just smaller than the nut I'm going to put in there. I'm going to get a small grinding piece and grind the hole out to a rough hexagon shape and then set the nut down in there and tack weld it front and back. Then I'll hammer the piece up in there, weld it in place, and grind the excess metal off the bottom. I ordered the cheap Harbor Freight welder. I figure I'll use it for a while and once I get a nice one I should be able to sell it cheap. Thanks for all the ideas. I've taken pics throughout and I'll post them once I'm done to see what you guys think and any potential issues you think might arise. I'm also debating if I need the 2 rosette welds or if they're unnecessary. What do you guys think?

Don´t really need to say this, but I will. Try and get the nut as square as possible, or you may never get your spring bolt started.
When you get your nut in there, show the guys at the spring shop, they can tell pretty quick, if they think your construction is to mild and have the ovens to harden if necessary. Ovens will often, mess up your threads.
Rossette welds, or spot welds, I´d go with at least two per side, simple leverage.
I have a tendancy, to over engineer some, you´ll probably be OK with what you got. Check it periodically for stretching and cracks.
Just throwing some idesa out there, I really like redundant constructions as much as possible.
Good luck and waiting for your pictures, I´ve been lucky so far with the rear spring bolts. Pretty close, a couple of times, to snapping them off.

Well, after deciding not to drill & tap the chunk because of concerns over how hard the metal is, I continued along the same lines of thinking about using the big chunk and thought I would just drill it out big and weld a nut in the middle. Taking a step back, I see that that is a waste of effort and possible frustration trying to get the nut centered perfectly and hold it there until I can weld it. Anyways, I grabbed some 1/8" thick steel my dad had sitting around, drilled a 9/16" hole, and had my dad weld the nut on the back for me. Monday, I'll just bolt it up and drive it. Then when I get the chance, I'll weld that piece in there and weld a patch over the hole I cut in the bottom.

Find you a Firepower 130 amp (110v) mig. Mine is on its 4th year and I've done everything to it, short of dropping it in a bucket of water, and it will not quit. It welds thin guage sheeting to 3/8 pipe with ease. Trust me, I have thousands of feet of pipe fence, all welded with that.

Well, I got the cheap Harbor Freight welder and it did the trick. I'm sure I'll want something more powerful in the future, but this one has already paid for itself. I welded a patch over the hole, ground it down smooth, and painted it. You can't even tell I ever cut it. Welding is kind of fun. What is a good way to tell if you have enough penetration? I practiced on a bunch of scraps to begin with and I tested it out by slamming stuff with a hammer to see if it would break, but I'd rather not do that to stuff I'm welding for a reason. I hold it until the metal starts to pool and then move on so I get a continuous nice bead. Hope that's the right way to do it.

Another question. I'm now in the process of putting on the T&J Chassis Stiffener and I'm going to do some rosette welds on the bottom of the skids to the XJ sub-frame rails. I've ground the sub-frame rail to bare metal where the rosette welds will go. My welder only goes up to 90 amps so I don't think I'll burn through, what are some other things that could possibly happen from welding to the unibody? You just let the metals pool together and then move on, right? Does a faster wire speed generate more heat or anything? or just more wire that melts into the weld? These are all probably simple questions, but thanks for any input.

The welder you have has only two heat settings, nominally about 65 amps and about 85 amps. I just sold mine because even the 65 amp setting is too high for sheet metal.

And the XJ "frame" is sheet metal. I suggest you try using the lower setting, and inspect after the first short pass to be sure you're not blowing right through the frame material.

I welded it this morning. I don't know how strong the welds are, but I didn't get any burn through. I know the welds are holding so far because I can feel that the chassis is just a little stiffer than before. I've still got to do the other side, so that should stiffen it up even more. It's hard to get a good weld on the underside of the "frame rails" laying on the ground .