Newbie from Kintyre

[Migmac]

Hi Guys/ Gals, absolute newbie to welding. Getting a mig for Xmas, so got a bit of time to read up on techniques and see what's what in the welding world. Looking at a Clarke Mig 152, any views on it?

Migmac

 

[the snooper]

welcome to the forum , he Clarke migs seem to get positive reviews on here

 

[Cobbler]

Before you decide on the Clarke 152, look at the minimum power, it's 40 amps, this is too high for car bodywork & thin metal. It's one of their budget range machines. I've also not seen any reviews on these yet. Depending on what you want to use it for, you may be better off spending a bit more & getting one of their better range 135, 150, 160 etc as they go down to 30amps minimum. This would be far easier for thin stuff. Also these are an older well proven design with spares available everywhere.

Sorry to put a slight dampener on your possible choice but I would rather be honest & try to give good advice & save you money & grief in the future. Welcome to the Forum by the way, loads of useful advice on here

Cobble

Edit. Just looked at the spec & it looks like it only takes the mini spools of wire, not the 5 kilo ones. These work out more expensive.

 

[Migmac]

Thanks for the welcome guys, no apologies needed Cobbler. We joined to learn and get advice from people who know a lot more than me

Migmac

 

[jackjosh]

I started off on a Clarke 150TE and still have it, they are good machines. I got mine off gumtree for £80

 

[Migmac]

If we could get one for £80 I would be a happy welder! My son and I have a budget of £200 ish for a machine, so limited in what we can get

Al

 

[jackjosh]

If we could get one for £80 I would be a happy welder! My son and I have a budget of £200 ish for a machine, so limited in what we can get

Al

I am only about 40 mins from Glasgow so there is a big s/h market. Clarke are good though and if you can find one at the right price you won't go far wrong. There may be others as well but I don't know much about these.

 

[Alister]

I got a clarke 160en off ebay for £150 but then spent around £200 on gas and other bits and pieces. It did work gasless but changing to gas made a massive difference to the quality of my welds.
I could have used cheap disposable bottles but reconed it would be more expensive in the long run.