SIP Migs really just crap?

boatwayupnorth · Jan 13, 2009

BillJ said:
To answer your question as to how a more expensive transformer can influence duty cycle, transformer size is not the only variable. Transformer quality (of construction and materials) can determine efficiency, i.e. how much of the input power reaches the output. The difference between input and output power is dissipated as heat. So while a larger transformer will heat up less for a particular power loss, a more efficient transformer will have a smaller power loss to dissipate to start with.

Another variable is open-circuit voltage. I gather that some electrodes are supposed to work best a high-ish OCV. The 6013 rods I bought require, according to the packaging, a minimum 50V OCV. My cheapo arc welder claims 48V OCV, which Im hoping is close enough - just measured it and it ranges from 39V to 46V over the current range. I don't know how this compares with more expensive 160A AC welders and I haven't actually used this particular welder yet.

I hope the really cheapo arc welders aren't total rubbish because I bought one of the Aldi ones a few weeks ago to get back into arc welding. I had a £50 SIP (Weldmate 140?) about 20 years ago from Argos because I could afford neither a MIG (starting price about £500 back then ) nor to pay someone to weld my Minis at £10-£15 per hour. I taught myself to weld thin bodywork (Minis, remember?) with an AC arc welder out of necessity. There's no way I would consider that now that I have a MIG (albeit one of the crappier ones).

Then again, I take your point that with the complexity of a MIG compared to an AC arc welder, a cheaply-constructed MIG has the potential to be a lot worse than a cheaply-constructed arc welder. I bought a SIP MIG so I should know...

After all this time I expect to be rubbish with a stick welder so it'll be hard to tell whether it's me or the box. I do wish I hadn't given the SIP 140 away many years ago when I moved house

Hi BillJ and everybody!
I'm new to the forum, standing on the brink of buying my second welder. The first one was many years before one of the cheapo arc welders you were discussing here and neither machine nor operator did meet any standards all then. So, here I am, wondering wether or not to take the chance to buy a MIG. Plans are to use it for building a 40 ft steelboat with the all the weld work surrounding such a project. Welding experience is minimal and professional advice hard to find. I'm living in the far north of Norway were everything costs at least twice as much as anywhere else and the quotes I got for Lincoln, Miller, Esab and Kemppi MIGs put them way out of my reach.
I found some unknown Chinese brands and the much scorned SIP - a SIP Migmate 150 DP to be precise.
I have read the active discussions about SIP migs and also the modifications done on them. All seem to agree that these machines do reasonably well in the beginning and that things go downhill the older the welder gets. So, I would like to ask you and everybody else with a SIP Mig wether or not you think this SIP welder
- would be up to the task of building a single larger project as a 40 ft boat and
- is totally useless in the hands of an unexperienced beginner?
As I said, this is my first message on the forum and English is a foreign language to me. Please bear with me for any technical or linguistical screw up ...

Walter

madkayaker · Jan 13, 2009

I'll say hello again. Was saying might be worth moving and someone did!

Robotstar5 · Jan 13, 2009

madkayaker said:
I'll say hello again. Was saying might be worth moving and someone did!

Bet the all-seeing eye has been at it again!

madkayaker · Jan 13, 2009

yep hes a bit quicker now hes quit drinking

Drains · Jan 13, 2009

Hi boatwayupnorth!

You have a number of factors to deal with to weld this project.

1) Are you going to build this boat inside or outside?
2) How thick is the steel?
3) How much welding will you have to do?

1) If you're building the boat outside, you can only use mig if you can screen off the wind - any wind.
2) Any steel above 3mm and your SIP 150 will struggle, especially if
3) You have a lot of welding to do. The duty cycles on the SIP just won't be up to long runs of weld - it will overheat and cut out.

I recently built a 50ft steel boat, outside, and mostly with a 300A mig. I could have done it with a 200A industrial (high duty) set. I spent a lot of time moving screens about, and giving up because of the wind. If I were doing it again, i'd use MIG with flux-core wire, or I'd do the job with stick - a reasonable inverter (140A would do), and good rods.

Forget the SIP mate, it really isn't built for that kind of job. It would be totally useless in the hands of an experienced professional too!

Hope that helps
Si

Drains · Jan 13, 2009

Ew. Everything just went bbbbrrrrrzzzip, and here we are! That time/space interface must be playing up again....

madkayaker · Jan 13, 2009

give it a kick it will settle down.

boatwayupnorth · Jan 13, 2009

Hi Drains,
thanks for your comments. I will have to build inside some sort of shelter. Don't know where yet, but I'm looking. The side panels for the boat are 4 mm, keel sole is 12, pilothouse and deck 3.
Thanks for your assessment concerning the SIP Mig, I almost figured something like that. I am still a bit reluctant to drop the Migs - stick welding seems too scary for me as a beginner. I thought about a Miller Migmatic 171 - still only 150 A max, but a much better duty cycle. But the price ... Would imply a terrifying amount of sucking up to my better half at least for the next couple of years!
What would you think - is it realistic to start with stick welding all by my own? Or would you rather go with a small Miller MIG?

Boatwayupnorth

madkayaker · Jan 13, 2009

stick welding is reasonably straight forward on those thicknesses there is a lot of info on stick on here

gavuk · Jan 13, 2009

Drains is right on the mark,i did some barge welding with mig ,wind was a pain,always blowing the gas away spent loads of time moving shelters around,flux cored or arc would be easier,not sure of cost of consumables tho?

aero · Jan 14, 2009

One idea.....Norway is connected to the rest of europe by road last time I looked. Why not see if its worth buying a decent brand welder elsewhere? The joys of ebay etc.

Don't know how much fuel that would take, but I know lads from Norway buy shed loads of tools in Holland (where we were working) to take home with them, in many cases the prices in Holland where half those in Norway.

boatwayupnorth · Jan 14, 2009

aero said:
One idea.....Norway is connected to the rest of europe by road last time I looked. Why not see if its worth buying a decent brand welder elsewhere? The joys of ebay etc.

Don't know how much fuel that would take, but I know lads from Norway buy shed loads of tools in Holland (where we were working) to take home with them, in many cases the prices in Holland where half those in Norway.

Hi Aero,
yes, Norway is sort of connected to Europe, but it also has 25 % VAT and a very observant customs service. A MIG welder is hardly something you can take with you on the plane as hand luggage and when I order something across the border, until I am done with all the hazzle of VAT refund and Norwegian VAT + transport there really is not so much to save. I have tried, believe me!

weldequip · Jan 14, 2009

Are you planning on using/keeping/living on this boat?
weldequip

boatwayupnorth · Jan 14, 2009

weldequip said:
Are you planning on using/keeping/living on this boat?
weldequip

It's the big dream for the future, so I'm building for me. And of course, it's going to be home for longer periods at a time.
Weldequip, you seem to know it all what's worth knowing about welders - I'm enjoying your comments on the forum very much! What would you recommend for my purpose? A reasonably priced hobby Mig or a stick/ inverter? Do you have any concrete suggestions in terms of manufacturer and modells?
And have you sold to Norway?

snowcat · Jan 14, 2009

just to add my two pennith, really it is going to be budget, by far the quickest way would be a large industrial MIG, preferably with a SWFU, then use either flux core/ or solid gas shielded wire, if conditions are suitable, productivity to could certainly be double over working with an arc, a S/H machine may be of consideration......

second option, either large heavy oil filled arc or new decent Inverter, Initial outlay would be much less, no issues with shielding, however the welding will take much longer, also the skill needed especially positional will be somewhat......

Any big manufacturers machine is/or should be decent, some offer 3 years warranty, In my experience its piece of mind only, well mad equipment holds its own, in terms of reliability......

If I was making it I would proberbly use arc and MIG, tack up and maybe root with the stick, then fly along and Cap everything with the MIG, ultimately tho It maybe a matter of budget which chooses the path you follow

weldequip · Jan 15, 2009

I would forget any & all hobby type MIGs and MMA (stick) machines if you have no welding experience, and get the thing professionally welded...especially the hull. It will have to be seaworthy & pass a marine survey...it won't if you have no welding experience

If you intend to use it yourself then great, enjoy it, but don't get any illusions of being able to build it & then sell it on for a profit...steel built boats (dependant on type) have a very poor re-sale value because of high build & maintenance costs.
Anyway, don't let me put you off your dream. Good luck.
weldequip

boatwayupnorth · Jan 15, 2009

Weldequip, thanks for the advice! I didn't think to jump right into welding the hull. I only recently started looking for someplace or somebody who can take me by the hand until I feel up to the task. I am serious about the project, though and thought that buying the welder first would get me started with learning. There are always a thousand things that need fixing and I often thought that a welder would be a nice thing to have for a lot of them.
Boatwayupnorth

chunkolini · Jan 15, 2009

I was looking at an SIP welder when my ancient clarke thingy died. Across the board from three forums and people in the trade I was told to avoid SIP welders as they were 'crap'.

The main thing I was told was to look out for copper wound transformers and a eurotorch fitting. Most of the SIP machines had aluminium wound transformers. Some of the guys telling me this were the people you just listen to. So I listened and after a lot of research I came across Butters welders. These seem to be the entry level welder with pro features, built down to a price but stil up to the job. I bought the 180amp version. 2.5 years later no complaints. Recommended.

Chunko'.

Drains · Jan 15, 2009

There are rumours that Butters AMT have gone to the wall. Their website doesn't exist anymore. So possibly not the best buy right now, if you're looking for after sales service. I notice DIY Welding have stopped stocking Butters stuff too.
Another casualty

Boatway - if you were to weld the boat up yourself, you'd certainly have to learn what you're doing first,and how to check the quality of your welds. Weldequip maybe wrong to say your welds have to be passed by a marine surveyor. That's not the case in the UK, necessarily, and it may not be the case in Norway either.

In the UK, boat welds don't have to be done by a certified welder, and they don't have to be inspected, as a boat can pass survey whilst in the water. This doesn't apply necessarily to ocean-going vessels, which may need an out of water survey to gain certification. And don't imagine that a marine surveyor would know a good weld if it stuck his steel toecaps together!

You would learn a lot in tacking up the boat and in fitting the frames - there's a lot of stitching and tacking to do to get the boat ready for welding. There will be bulkheads to weld, which are internal (so an opportunity to learn), and all your watertight welds should be dye-penetrant tested. You'd soon find out where you'd been going wrong.

The important thing is to be able to recognise the difference between a good weld and a bad one, and to be prepared to learn to do the former, and to reject, and grind out, the latter!

snowcat · Jan 15, 2009

interesting on the surveyor Si, I was asked on Monday to do an Insurance quote for a damaged Portside bow, (3500 tonner) looks an **** of a job cutting out of around 20ft total of damaged material choice job is working in the front P/S ballast tank to get to the ribs......

Now I wanted A) WPS B)a weld inspector C) a marine surveyor to do the appropriate reports before id touch it with yours, can I get any sense out of anyone can I B*****, the marine industry seems a barrel of Shiite to me.......

any house ended up putting in a quote thats probably worth more than the ship.... I hope they don't bite.....

SIP Migs really just crap?

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