Cebora Pocket Mig 883 do-over

[Pete.]

I picked up this little machine from Paul because I thought it might make a good starter mig for my stepson's lad, he's 16yrs old and an apprentice mechanic and Paul let it go so cheap it would be rude not to. It's been sat un-used for many years so it needed a good clean up and service. I've got it stripped down on the bench right now.

So I've stripped down the torch and removed the old plastic liner. Junked the small reel of 0.6mm wire because it was going rusty. Cleaned out the swan neck, straightened the spring inside so the wire exits dead centre instead of off to one side. I've bought a steel liner but now I am wondering if it's a good idea fitting a steel liner to an always-live torch? I can't think of any reason why it would be any different to a switched-live torch but I thought I would ask.

I've also stripped and greased the feed motor gearbox which was sounding very rough, and that's now running much better plus it sounds more like it should. Another thing I am thinking about doing is putting a light knurl on the edges of the feed roll groove to give better traction on the wire. Any reason I should not do this?

I'll stick some pics up tomorrow, hopefully should get some weld out of it though I'm not expecting much from it if I'm honest.

 

[WorkshopChris]

Any reason I should not do this?

Only thing that comes to mind what would happen if the end of the wire sticks to the front of the tip?(especially when first learning)
Would it continue to push wire past and start a birds nest, its getting the balance between feeding well but a little slip if necessary.

 

[Pete.]

Good point Chris, I'll leave it smooth and give the machine a try.

 

[Richard.]

Knurled rollers are really designed to grip cored wire. On solid wire they make shavings

 

[Pete.]

Well, it's done and it works a lot better than I thought it ever would. Here's what I've done.

I removed the spring in the swan neck after I found out that the new liner passes right through no problem. It was looking a little scabby anyway.

The plastic coating on the liner just about went through too so I had an idea for both securing it in the torch head and sealing it for gas. I cut a spare bit off to test and put some heat shrink on the end of the plastic sleeve. That made it exactly the right size to screw into the thread where the fitting for the old plastic sleeve screwed in. All I had to do was cut the liner to the right length, grind a cone on the end and sleeve it the same. Works great and I put a couple of cable ties on the power lead for extra support.

The other end I cut the brass fitting off the new liner and found that if I drilled the original brass fitting out to 4mm I could do exactly the same except it wasa tight fit so it needed no heat shrink. I had the idea that most of the wire feed problems people have with these is because of the flexible plastic side panel and the really poor method they use to secure the liner a lot of the ones I've seen pics of online have the mount wired up because it's broken the plastic clips. I figured I could improve that by rolling the end of a strip of metal so it grips the brass end then fixing it to the case with self-drilling drywall screws. As well as that I cut the end as close to the wheel as possible and ground a cone on it to get it in really tight. The result is a really firm drive and no birds-nests.

Apart from that and giving it a good blowing out with the air line I have fitted a new mains flex and used the same screws to secure the gas pipe. Here it is all done. Only thing left is to make a cover for the wire spool.

So how does it weld? Well, pretty good actually. Here's front and rear shots of my first coupons. I reckon it's going to do him just fine. Total spent less than 40 quid.

 

[Richard.]

Oh yeah that’s a great job there and she produces some tidy looking clean runs too. A straight through liner is defo the way forward.

 

[Paul.]

Well done Pete, its nice to see it working again, I actually did a couple of quite serious jobs with it in the 80s early 90s, A metro that ended up with more weld than original car, and a sierra and a fiesta that I kept limping along from mot to mot for several years, and a few repairs for others.
When it was new probably around 83 or 84 it was probably one of the first of the diy migs on the market, the machine I was using in my daily job was a migatronic 350 so a bit of a step down when I picked this up, I'm very pleased that someone will be making use of it.

 

[Richard.]

If it’s anything like my Cebora it’s probably under rated as far as power is concerned. Mines a boxer 195 amp on paper but I’ve measured over 220 amps out of it on the top settings.

 

[Jim Davey]

The original neck liner has a reduced section to make it easier for gas to flow past it. If you have to turn the gas right up go get good flow you might want to cut down your new liner so you can re-fit the original slim neck liner.

 

[Paul.]

Here are the handbook, an exploded diagram and a circuit diagram for the pocket mig.

 

[Pete.]

Thanks Paul.
I made a cover for the wire spool from an old metal tool box. It's handy because you can tuck the cables in it so they aren't flapping about.

I also visited a local welding supplier who did me a bustin' deal on some stuff, including a used auto darkening helmet for £15.

 

[HughF]

Just done a freshen up on one of these for a forum member, nice little machine. I was quite impressed.

 

[Pete.]

Cool - do you think one of these would ever manage on 0.8mm wire? I only tried 0.6 in this one.

 

[Richard.]

Cool - do you think one of these would ever manage on 0.8mm wire? I only tried 0.6 in this one.

Absolutely.
0.8mm wire is happy enough performing even at currents as low as 40-50 amps.
I don’t really like 0.6.
0.8 all the way for me.

 

[Windy Miller]

Cool - do you think one of these would ever manage on 0.8mm wire? I only tried 0.6 in this one.

I have a spare roll of 0.8 wire if you'd like to try it @Pete.

 

[Pete.]

I got some 0.8 thanks Andy. I'll give it a try sometime soon.

 

[stevec17]

I picked up this little machine from Paul because I thought it might make a good starter mig for my stepson's lad, he's 16yrs old and an apprentice mechanic and Paul let it go so cheap it would be rude not to. It's been sat un-used for many years so it needed a good clean up and service. I've got it stripped down on the bench right now.

So I've stripped down the torch and removed the old plastic liner. Junked the small reel of 0.6mm wire because it was going rusty. Cleaned out the swan neck, straightened the spring inside so the wire exits dead centre instead of off to one side. I've bought a steel liner but now I am wondering if it's a good idea fitting a steel liner to an always-live torch? I can't think of any reason why it would be any different to a switched-live torch but I thought I would ask.

I've also stripped and greased the feed motor gearbox which was sounding very rough, and that's now running much better plus it sounds more like it should. Another thing I am thinking about doing is putting a light knurl on the edges of the feed roll groove to give better traction on the wire. Any reason I should not do this?

I'll stick some pics up tomorrow, hopefully should get some weld out of it though I'm not expecting much from it if I'm honest.

Thanks for the info, got one of these but not used for 25 years, fires up but the feed is intermittent speed, might try your method