The 40 year old shop Airco mig welder finally gave up the ghost this last week. It was getting difficult to run wanting to fluctuate voltage, you could hear it while welding. Some years ago I ran Linde, Miller, Lincoln and just about every other major brand stick or mig. But I always liked the Hobart mig, so that's what I spent the bosses money on and it will do what I want for the shop repairs.
Very nice! I have a 40 year old Hobart BetaMig 200. Had to re-glue the magnet on wire-feed motor and new whip/gun. Otherwise, still running strong. She’s been a solid machine for what I do. And, with all the multi-voltage machines out now, I bought the Hobart 210 MVP- only run flux-core so far but very happy.
That should be a good machine, I run a Miller 252 with mostly .035 wire so it's overkill most of the time. But when I use .045 dual shield or solid wire is nice to have the extra capacity. I do have a little Hobart Handler 110V machine with .024 wire... my son has built no end of Jeep stuff with it, bumpers, racks, etc. He must have learned well even though he's actually a machinist now.
When it comes to these types of tools/equipment I won't even look at it if it doesn't have a major brand name. Here's a funny one one about a boss that I worked for some years ago. He was a Snap-On man all the way, He bought a Snap-On mig welder that I think was made by Century for Snap-On---What a pos, It never was consistent with arc from day one and the spool drive would rat nest at the drop of a hat causing all kinds of hate and discontent. And Snappy really didn't know what to do about it. After while no one would use it they would rather stick weld with the buzz than use that mig. One afternoon the boss was busy getting ready to do some welding with his pride and joy{he had never really used it before, after about two hours of pulling burned tips, wire and rat nested wire out of it he went ballistic. He grabbed the closest thing available {a piece of 2" pipe about 4' long and proceeded to cave the front and top in. But he forgot to unplug it sparks were flying and the breaker popped fortunately for his sake. He was so pi$$ed his ears were red.
I know this really doesn't relate but over on the TBN site theres a thread about "Harbor Tools that DONT Suck".. & the DIY crowd is praising the little welder HF is selling.. Maybe they don't know what they're doing, {which is common over there.lol} but theres nothing but good things to say about it. IDK, I don't weld..
The Hobarts are often basic versions of Miller products. Good stuff. Nothing fancy but gets the job done.
I did something similar to that to a coffee maker once... wouldn't make coffee and wouldn't quit beeping at me. Turn out that some genius (me) had not quite put all it's little parts back in right and it was trying to tell me by beeping at me. All I knew at 3 AM is that it wasn't making coffee...
Well you're not alone, I have had days like that. One I recall was a simple little carb on a maybe 3 horse Briggs. Can't get much simpler than that but for some reason I could not get the carb to stop leaking gas. Believe me I tried many things and just lost it! That sucker hit the concrete wall at about Mach 3! Ordered a new carb and engine ran great after that one was installed. Still have that old David Bradley garden tractor, has not been run in many years, almost afraid to see if I can get it running again. My arm is not as good as it was back then and new carbs are hard to find for them these days!
When I was 12, we had this fussy Epson printer that my dad hated. Never seemed to fail, he would go to print an invoice and the printer would just quit in the middle of the job. One night, my brother and I were watching tv while dad was in his office. We hear a loud, booming yell of angst, and crack and whip of a cord and here comes dad barging out of the computer room with that printer in hand. He covers the lving room in two steps and hurls that printer out the front door onto the driveway. My brother and I froze, not knowing what was going to happen next. Dad turns around, takes one look at our bug eyed, slack jawed expressions and bursts into laughter. "Get your coats, were going to office max."
I bought a Hobart Handler 190 about 6 years ago. It has been a nice machine, but I don't think I have 20 hours on it yet in 6 years. I ran flux core through mine for the project I was doing at the time, I've never even hooked mine up to a bottle of gas yet. One of these days, when things slow down, maybe...
I think I was about 9 or 10 when dad bought an air grease gun because he was tired of the lever style. I think he got 1 cam tube greased and then spent the next 45 minutes trying to purge the air out of it. I'm just greasing away with the old school grease gun. Hear a dull thud on the other side of the truck. There's dad beating the **** out of the air grease gun with a 12lb sledge. I think that was the day we got the Lincoln cordless grease gun lol.
I had a Cuisinart coffee pot that kept harassing me . One day I gave it a trial by fire, flunked....... it would not hold up under .45 ACP fire. Trashy overpriced POS.
There is just something hilarious about people beating the **** out of inanimate objects, and if other inanimate objects see it happening they tremble when the killer walks by. Your hammer knows his job and all other objects fear the hammer.
caffieneacide
Weed whacker got the best of me. Pretty much wore out my shoulder joint trying to get it running. I smashed the motor end on a hydro pole about a dozen times. It was pretty quiet in the house after that so finally my wife says “I guess we need to go shopping for a new weed trimmer.” I burst out laughing
I've had a Lincoln wirematic 250 for close to 20 plus years, has been a good machine for shop projects and welding buckets, plows, trailers, and truck bodies. Kick myself for not buying it with the spool gun attachment that can no longer be found. I remember when we were kids, mom was making some waffles for a Sunday morning, dead of winter breakfast, I can remember the waffle maker perfectly, it was orange and black and the heaviest damned thing. It was causing her quite a bit of grief, and she has tons of patience, all of a sudden she mutters something under her breath, yanks the chord out of the wall, runs over to the back slider, opens it and chucks the thing out over the deck and into the couple feet of snow, my brothers and I rushed to the window to watch it sink down in the snow, she walked back into the kitchen and we were all just looking at her wide eyed and jaws dropped, she walked over to the cabinet, grabs a griddle and proclaimed " PANCAKES IT IS!!" We still laugh about that today....
That one reminds me of me and by brother fighting at breakfast. Mom used to make crepes, smear jelly on them, fer breakfast, and we would get to arguin about who got the biggest half, and the rule was born, one cuts, and one picks his half. That evened things up, mostly. One day, I figgered out that the electric fryin pan hadda short in it... When It was my brother's turn to cut, with the metal spatula, I reached over, left hand on the metal sink, and grabbed his right ear, after licking my fingers! Viola, The electric wet willy was born!!
I did the same thing with a stapler. That thing would screw up staples and jam for what seemed like years. Finally we got a new one, I took that old one out in the parking lot which was freshly concreted and gave the concrete a strength test. It was satisfying to show that stapler who's boss.
Funny stories! Been there, too.... Reminds me of Christmas Vacation “fixed the newel post!”
One evening last deer season I sat in a different blind...getting a little chilly so I went to light the heater. Fought with the damn thing for a good 20 minutes, finally unscrewed it from the tank, opened the window and threw it the lake. Good riddance. Ed
Still use my 63 year old Hobart often. Sure wish I'd wear it out so I could have a new one; but I don't think a new one would last like this one has.
Have a used Miller 210 I have come to enjoy using, did not spend a fortune on it and welds as proficiently as I can muster, even came with a Aluminum small reel gun and a Argon Tank. Bought the suitcase DC stick Welder, not been so amazed by a small package so well, love that little machine.
The unpleasantness has been removed to the "Moved/Edited Threads" subforum in the Moderators' section. Some other posts have also been removed, for continuity. Carry on, but respectfully, please...
I made a good choice with the Hobart, nice instant arc and very smooth plus the gun and lead are so much lighter than the old Tweco gun on the old Airco. Although I did drop it back to 030 wire from the 035 I was running because most of the repairs are landing gear, exhaust so not much need in bigger wire, but I can change it back to 035 at the drop of a hat so that option is setting on the shelf.
I bought the same rig last year for my shop, love it!!
That video of "fixed the newel post" reminded me of a story mom told about her dad. Seems when mom was a little kid running around the house on more than one occasion she managed to smack her head on the corner of the dinning room table. Being daddy's little girl he came up with a solution but grandma caught him just as he started to put the saw to the dinning room table. Dang I sure wish I could have known that guy! I think we would have hit it off good!
I've had the same Hobart for several years and it's a consistently good performer, I always release the tension on the wire feeder after use.
1693TA- I also got an old Hobart SAE 300 although its not in nearly the same condition. mine has battered tin and somebody painted it an ugly brown. I always wondered what it would look like in the original blue lol. it was a lot cheaper than a Lincoln or miller. I may have got it cheap because the polarity switch was wired backwards and you couldn't burn 6010 rods without the polarity switch in the wrong position. that old flathead Chrysler 6 sure barks when using the air-arc. parts for the generator are probably getting hard to find though
This is the only Hobart engine drive I've owned. 600 amps at 100 percent, 800 at 60. CV and CC, had a little growling 2-71 Detroit for power. It was great for air-arc duty with huge carbons.
That's a burner RZ, My brother inlaw had one just like it mounted on a F700 with a 20' bed along with the rest of his welding equipment.
I used to have a 400 amp Lincoln with a 2 71. It would vibrate your work off the deck on the back of the truck, but it sure poured 3 32 wire like a hot dam.
I got a new Cat powered welder today. The cat powered part may be a drawback.
Can imagine Purrs like a Kitten!!