Picked up an Aldi MIG welder today

Picked up an Aldi MIG welder today - now with crappy pics!

Hi Guys,

I read some of the speculation on the forum the other day, so thought I'd post up my findings on buying one today.

The settings go from 35-135, via 6 settings, all which also alter the wire speed.

It has large battery quick release style connectors inside for swapping polarity for gas/gasless wire.

It comes with a co2 cylinder (small hobby ones) a mask (horrible thing to be honest! not that its getting used, I've got my autodarkening lid out of retirment) gas and gasless wire, various gauge feed wheels, a number of shrouds and a number of tips, even a small bottle regulator.

The instruction manual is clear and helpful, the 3 year warrenty is a comfort, but the interior of the welder seems of a reasonable standard - certainly not industrial spec, but compariable to other hobby mig welders I;ve seen and used.

The wire feed mechanism seems to be stronger than the SIP set up.

There is the odd self tappers on show internally which you "could" catch yourself on, but it is by no means badly made.

The warrenty says contact omegawolf.com so the speculation of it being a rebranded wolf product seems correct.

I haven't had chance to use it yet, but for those interested it seems pretty good value at £130 odd for a gas/gasless 35-135 hobby style welder with everything to get you started.

Hopefully this answers some of the speculation and guessing which was going on.

Excellent - and George was right about it starting at 35 amps rather than 25 amps too. Go on - post some photos. And pictures of some welds too.

ok, so I had a bit of a go with the gas setup... and it doesn;t seem to be working very well at all.

After a few initial wire feed issues (which were due to the roller being too tight and bird nesting rather than slipping) I started.

CO2 is one of those crappy disposables, so please forgive the brown discolouration, I'm sure its due to poor gas flow.

The first is some 2-3mm thick mild angle, that I cleaned up on the end with the grinder so it was nice and shiney. even on the 2nd to highest it shows zero penertration, like not even a little bit. It has melted the wire and its just sat on top of the parent metal.

The settings are as follows: second to highest amps (105), middle wire speed turned through to slowest to see if it helps. torch movement was VERY VERY slow.

I cant go to the top setting due to it tripping the rcd to the garage. I turned the wire speed as far down as I could, and it made no difference.

The second picture is less than 1mm thick stainless (I didn;t have any really thin mild) but I wanted to check it could at least blow holes in the thin stuff. Left it on the 2nd to top setting (105amps!!!!) slow wire speed. NOTHING, no penertration and definatly still no holes!

Have I got a gutless wonder of a welder?

I'm used to arc welding, where I can blow holes in 3mm steel with ease, so whats up with the mig?

Also the arc seems very..stuttery, my auto darkening helmet was struggling to keep up with the flashes.

SOOOOO have I got a duffer, or is there something simple like the wire speed that needs changing? Like I said, I've tried fast and slow torch movements, and in the end I was just leaving the torch practically stationary to see if I could blow holes - which it wouldn't.

doesn't Look too good if I were you I would put it back in the box and get your money back put the money under the mattress and keep adding to it until you have the price of the have decent one

due to it tripping the rcd to the garage

Do you mean an RCD or a MCB? If it's tripping an RCD then there is a fault with it, you shouldn't get any earth leakage at any current.

sorry i mean MCB, those little trip switch things, there are about 12 of them in a row, and the one for the garage trips at full power.

According to other peoples posts,the disposable gas cylinders ,don't always put out enough gas.
Slowest wire speed would be lowest amps.
Was the wire hitting the metal and not melting ?
You need to turn the wire speed up until the wire starts to push the torch away from the metal, and then back it off a little.
Or it may be a duffer.
Robert

I couldn't resist the temptation and bought one of these Aldi MIG welders today, too. I agree with any positive comments on the build quality. Inside and outside, it looks of perfectly good quality to me, and appears fully fit for purpose, if that's hobby level work. (Whether it works or not - rather important - is a different matter, of course!). The motor looks larger than the one on my 'professional' level Sealey MIG. The earth clamp is 300A and one of the most solid I've ever seen. The torch looks at least as good as my Sealey torch. It's definitely non-live feed. The manual says the coarse adjustment on wire speed is controlled automatically as you adjust the power output from 1-6. So the wire speed knob is only for fine tuning, it seems. Is that approach used by many producers?

I don't know whether to keep it (and try it out) or take it back (unused), having satisfied my curiosity. I reckon I could probably get almost as much as this unit cost for my secondhand Sealey, so I have to decide which is the better bet. I was erring towards thinking that newer is better, until I saw the above photos, but are they a valid sample? Something is clearly amiss but is that a machine fault or some kind of operator error? I'm in a dilemma. If I got results as bad as those, I could demand a refund on the basis that the welder was not of merchantable quality, but that seems so unlikely.

They do need to get their act together, though, on some of the product descriptions and other wording. For example, the pack said it weighs 23Kg and was a 2 person lift. I thought I could carry that, so I did but it seemed heavier than 23Kg. When I got home, I weighed it at just over 30Kg. That's the entire pack, including the gas cyclinder, 2 reels of MIG wire and spare parts. Secondly, it's correctly described as non-live feed on the carton but the manual says or implies it's live feed.

Another thing I like, compared to my Sealey, is the relatively compact size. It's not much larger than my Cosmo arc welder, which I see as an advantage in terms of storage space.

Silly me!

R kraft - your right! I'm used to arc welding where I;d increase the arc length to make it more powerful, in my mind speeding up the wire makes the arc shorter - but obviously my logic is flawed!

I have just used the same peice of 2.5mm angle and reasonable penetration at 80-90amps with the highest wire speed. The whole peice was glowing cherry red, which is a first for the evening!

My gas has ran out just I've understood the basics! ARG!

I need to sort the tripping consumer unit to be able to weld anything heavier gauge as I can't use the top two settings (well the 2nd to top i can sometimes use, but the top is a consistent black out!)

cheers guys - guess I won't be returning it after all, I just need to have a play with the settings.

You might post a photo of the wire feed set up, in the little thing, not too much info on the Wolf welders available
Or even upload a copy of the owners manual, if it is convenient for you, and if Malcom wants it.
Robert

R Kraft said:

You might post a photo of the wire feed set up, in the little thing, not too much info on the Wolf welders available
Or even upload a copy of the owners manual, if it is convenient for you, and if Malcom wants it.
Robert

Click to expand...

I have a good photo of the wire feed unit and almost everything else, plus a pdf scan of the entire manual but it seems I can't post any images here now that I'm on pre-moderated status. I can link to external hosting sites but I wouldn't know how to post a pdf document, either way.

Have a skim through the tutorial Dangle_kt. You ought to find it's possible to weld, but you'll have to be perfect with set up and technique - it's the size of the sweet spot that tends to get bigger with more expensive welders. You'd probably be able to jump on mine and be able to use it well instantly, but that one is likely to need practice.

What size MCD is tripping? Normally that size of welder can be run from a domestic 3 pin plug.

I've fixed your photo uploading George.

malcolm said:

I've fixed your photo uploading George.

Click to expand...

Many thanks. Here are four photos. I don't think I can mix text and images unless the images are hosted externally.

1. MOTOR - the motor looks larger in real life than in the photo. Is the current rating up to the job? It's certainly not as substantial as a Portamig motor but I would hazard a guess than it's probably on a par with entry-level models from Sealey, Clarke, et al.

2. SPEED CONTROLLER - I guess the PCB is made with components from the Far East. I don't expect ANY electronics to last long these days so I reckon this could be a weak point, but that's just a hunch. I'm sceptical that Sealey and Clarke would use superior grade components. I wonder where this Aldi/Wolf welder is assembled. Italy? It's clearly made by the same people who made the Wolf Arc 100 welder which I turned into a spot welder. The internals share a lot of similarities.

3. TORCH - the torch end looks adequate enough. I can't see there's much to go wrong as long as you don't use rusty wire or something.

4. WIRE FEED - the wire feed mechanism might need some reinforcement or enhancement, like for SIP welders, perhaps. I simply don't know. I'm sure a separate power feed would also help, like for SIP welders. It's hard to understand why they would have the confidence to guarantee the unit for 3 years if anything like the wire feed is simply not up to the job. At £139 I'd be happy to repair the wire feed, even if goes wrong outside of the guarantee period.

malcolm said:

What size MCD is tripping? Normally that size of welder can be run from a domestic 3 pin plug.

.

Click to expand...

Hi Malcolm, thanks for the advice, the MCB is marked up as 16 - I'd guess that is 16amps?

I have a few 32's and alot of 8's (or maybe they were 6's - i forget!) in the consumer unit.

I am running it on an extension lead, could this be causing problems? I;d plug it straight into the wall, but the kit car is in the way!

I'll do some searching around fitting more suitable sockets into garages.

malcolm said:

What size MCD is tripping? Normally that size of welder can be run from a domestic 3 pin plug.

Click to expand...

Some guidance is given on the box and in the manual. A 30 amp supply must make sense to provide a bit of headroom, just for the higher settings:

Is there anything else on the 16A MCB (maybe a freezer in the garage?) if so that may be taking you over the limit for that circuit.
The circuit board looks to be OK, the only point I would pick up on is the power resistor should be mounted away from the board on stand offs to prevent any heat generated damaging the PCB (also the connector and capacitor in this case).
Arran

Dangle_kt said:

Hi Malcolm, thanks for the advice, the MCB is marked up as 16 - I'd guess that is 16amps?

I have a few 32's and alot of 8's (or maybe they were 6's - i forget!) in the consumer unit.

I am running it on an extension lead, could this be causing problems? I;d plug it straight into the wall, but the kit car is in the way!

I'll do some searching around fitting more suitable sockets into garages.

Click to expand...

An extension lead drops the voltage to the welder,unless you have a very large lead.
If you have a voltage drop it will cause the welder to loose performance.
Robert

It's good to be reminded of the features of cheaper welders - you rarely see a 130 amp hobby welder that demands a 30 amp dedicated supply. Clarkes for example ask for 16 amps, but will run from a 13 amp plug.

Part of the fun I guess./ Take advice on the circuit before just changing the MCD - could be that's the limit of the circuit.

Converting this welder to run from a large gas bottle

Hi guys,
New to mig welding but bought this in local aldi a few days ago as thought it maght be a good stepping stone into mig welding. Planning to restore an old camper van in future. Welder is still unopened in box.
My concern is wether this unit will be up to the job, especially after reading that it appears to be tripping out 13amp domestic electricity supply.
Secondly, does anyone know what would be involved in getting this unit to run off a large CO2/argon gas bottle to make it more efficient in long run.
Any comments or tips greatly appreciated,
mosschops

GeorgeB said:

The torch looks at least as good as my Sealey torch. It's definitely non-live feed.

Click to expand...

Er sorry, but isn't it non-live when used with gasless wire only? Swapping the connectors over inside the box for use with gas/normal wire then makes the torch live?