Jefferson JEFMIG 225amp

[IrishDave]

Guys has anyone else had experience with this machine. I find I need it on full current for everything I do mostly making handrailings with 42mm black mild steel or 8mm plate. Have I got it set up wrong or could it be the electricity in my workshop not giving the machine what it needs to run correctly?

 

[BrokenBiker]

Guys has anyone else had experience with this machine. I find I need it on full current for everything I do mostly making handrailings with 42mm black mild steel or 8mm plate. Have I got it set up wrong or could it be the electricity in my workshop not giving the machine what it needs to run correctly?

firstly, if the supply in the workshop wasnt adequate it would trip breakers when it tried to pull too much current...just the fact that you can run the welder flat out means your supply is fine...

secondly, 8mm steel takes quite a bit of amps to weld so im not surprised you need to run it at full capacity to weld that.

when you say 42mm mils steel, is is 42mm plate, pipe, flat bar, solid square or shs? if it is 42mm thick then you are going to need all the power you can get really

 

[octo0072000]

i would be looking at 300amps mig yours is at it's limit

 

[IrishDave]

Sorry should have worded that a bit better for you haha basically its 42mm pipe railing with a wall thickness of 2.5mm I think maybe 3mm I need to check that. The railing gets bolted to walls so I put the plate on the end of the railing with two holes for thunderbolts but when I'm welding pipe to plate I just don't feel happy with the weld I will get a few pictures on Thursday

 

[BrokenBiker]

Sorry should have worded that a bit better for you haha basically its 42mm pipe railing with a wall thickness of 2.5mm I think maybe 3mm I need to check that. The railing gets bolted to walls so I put the plate on the end of the railing with two holes for thunderbolts but when I'm welding pipe to plate I just don't feel happy with the weld I will get a few pictures on Thursday

when welding to the 8mm plate you are going to have to run at the max to get the arc hot enough to penetrate the plate so that bit doesnt bother me with reagrds to there possibly being any problems...if you are running it on max settings when you are just welding bits of 3mm wall pipe together though there is something wrong as 225 amps will evaporate 3mm steel so maybe your welder is saying the setting are maxxed out but its actually only producing 120-150 amps?

a pic of the welds will give more info about what is going on there

 

[IrishDave]

I think the problem is because the guy that taught me changed it from a 110v plug to a 240v one we have no 110 sockets in our shop I have been asking for months now lol. When I'm welding the pipe to plate joint it melts into the pipe fine but you can see a ridge in some places where the weld isn't fusing properly to the parent metal. Also when I am joining pipe even with the edge grinded to 45° as soon as I begin the weld it lumps up is that normal? I feel it shouldn't be doing that

 

[BrokenBiker]

I think the problem is because the guy that taught me changed it from a 110v plug to a 240v one we have no 110 sockets in our shop I have been asking for months now lol. When I'm welding the pipe to plate joint it melts into the pipe fine but you can see a ridge in some places where the weld isn't fusing properly to the parent metal. Also when I am joining pipe even with the edge grinded to 45° as soon as I begin the weld it lumps up is that normal? I feel it shouldn't be doing that

is it a dual voltage machine? if it is then there should be no issue and running on 240 should be better at higher settings...but if its just a 110V machine and you are running it on 240 then you have probably blown something somewhere and im surprised it still works...i cant see why anyone would put a 240V plug on a machine that originally had a 110V plug...

EDIT***** from waht i have found on google, the mig is a 240V mig so should never have had a 110V plug on it so not sure what has been changed on yours but that machine wont run on 110V if it the same as this one...http://jeffersontools.com/welding/category/mig_welders/22/53

 

[IrishDave]

is it a dual voltage machine? if it is then there should be no issue and running on 240 should be better at higher settings...but if its just a 110V machine and you are running it on 240 then you have probably blown something somewhere and im surprised it still works...i cant see why anyone would put a 240V plug on a machine that originally had a 110V plug...

EDIT***** from waht i have found on google, the mig is a 240V mig so should never have had a 110V plug on it so not sure what has been changed on yours but that machine wont run on 110V if it the same as this one...http://jeffersontools.com/welding/category/mig_welders/22/53

I'm not sure will check now on the web and see

 

[IrishDave]

This is the only picture I have on my phone at the moment of one of the welding its usually welding onto an open end this one they are on the sides of a leg

 

[BrokenBiker]

what wire are you using? just normal solid mild steel wire? im not sure what is happeneing around the edges of the welds there to be honest.

have you dont any test welds and tried to break them at all? that would give a fair idea of whether the welds are strong or not...

are you using any sort of weave or whip and pause motion whilst welding?

 

[IrishDave]

I'm using 1.2mm copper coated filler wire and no I haven't tested any will on the weekend maybe probably not NDT. I use a pause motion on all the joints I find that the weaving builds the weld up to much and it get to lumpy where as the pause levels everything out. This may be a stupid question but would it have anything to do with polarity?

 

[BrokenBiker]

what is your polarity set at?

 

[NickyEng]

Those welds look like there's cold lap, like brokenbikers says I think your polarity is wrong? No way that they look like 225a on correct polarity.

 

[BrokenBiker]

Those welds look like there's cold lap, like brokenbikers says I think your polarity is wrong?

i never really thought about polarity as its usually a given that its correct but when the OP mentioned it i realised it could very well be set up for gasless wire instead of solid wire

to me the welds look like those of a fast freeze stick welding rod which is why i asked what wire was being used incase it was some exotic type of wire but seems to be just bog standard steel

 

[Davidcardiff]

Could the 1.2 be a bit big for the welder

 

[BrokenBiker]

another good point, i missed the 1.2mm bit...i thought anything up to around 250 amps would be 1mm wire really

 

[NickyEng]

It should be able to manage that OK if the 225A is the machines true max current rating.
I have heard that some foreign machines have not been able to produce anywhere near the rated max Amps.
I weld 10mm plate at 240A using 1.2mm wire
As David says try a smaller wire, say 1.0mm and see how you go.

 

[IrishDave]

I will definitely try some 1mm wire as soon as the reel runs out and I will check the polarity as soon as I get back to work on Thursday I never felt the need to check it as the guy that taught me set it up and said it was fine. I took his word for it and thought that's how mig welding goes until I started a course this year and was surprised at how easily it flowed on their machines. That's why I'm suspecting something is maybe wrong with my machine

 

[Davidcardiff]

Where bouts you located I mite have a kg or so of 1mm in the workshop

 

[IrishDave]

I'm in NI all you guys are across the pond I think?