As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
My old man bought a Lincoln welder long ago for my brother, who never welded shit with it, as he always made great claims to his abilities having mastered welding in shop class. I ended up using that welder, which was stored in a small fridge outside, next to the 220 plug in.
I was taught in Ag class how to weld, but welding pieces of metal in a confined environment, never taught anyone who to weld. Through cussing, disappointment, trial and Inspiration I became a pretty good welder in the methods I figured out, using the 6011 big sticks and only running into the thin little wands in the past years for light stuff.
I wanted though a back up welder as the Lincoln was old, and even though TL and I serviced it, it was still sticky.........thankfully the grease we put on the dial, soaked in over the summer and now it works like new.
Like all welders though it is a heavy beast and lifting it in and out of the fridge was an ordeal, even if the 50 foot 8 gauge extension cord we purchased was lovely in not having to try and fit big metal objects into a confined area.
I was surprised in the Thrift when this Montegomery Wards thing showed up. They wanted 160 bucks for it, and I wanted it as it was the answer to having a welder I would not have to lift and could move around to welding locations with that 50 foot cord.
We brought it home, it started fricking raining, so covered it up with plastic and a garbage can, and there it sat all through November with 2 inches of HAARP monsoon and me frowning as the weather mods plunged the temperatures to January.
On November 22nd, after much not wanting to do anything in being upset about the weather, the junk I have to deal with and wondering if it will break when I try to get things done, I started out small in grinding a welding bead on a big ball for a 5th wheel gooseneck trailer. Then moved to pumping a tire up on a junked livestock trailer, and then due to non donations, hooked up a junked Trition Ford that JYG had, complete with smoking tail pipe and moved the trailer, a Kieffer Built which means low quality to get the partition gate welded back on, as it had been tore off.
The people who had this trailer, broke the floor, broke the struts and it rusted out, which was last year's fun in welding as it sat there as I needed a pick up to pull it.
That was this Montegomery Wards adventure, and a review of these old welders.
This was as close as I could find to what I have.
It is a pretty simple set up. No digital which is the last thing I want as I doubt those Chinaman things will last. There is a lever to set the amps, instead of a Lincoln which just clicks you to settings to weld. There is a lock to hold the amp to where you set it, and the power switch.
Not allot of ground and welder cord, but is enough. There is a fan on it to cool it though that sounds like a jet engine.
This welder is not as forgiving in starting out on rusted metal. The Lincoln will arc on some pretty shitty stuff. You are supposed to grind off metal to clean surfaces, but as I told TL, no one does that, they just burn the rust off and no one would get anything welded if you were grinding metal before you could weld.
So as it is, I usually tap the ground with the rid and see if I can arc off of that. That did not work the best, but I did get a connection and once you have that, you can kind of blaze from that spot to where you want to weld. Yes welder tracks.
I was surprised in how friendly this welder was, as it was some old town guy I suppose who was taught by Doc Ag and thought he was a welder, as this welder was not used that much at all. Sat in some garage until I exposed it to the real world of work. They only had those wimpy light rods too which burn up fast so I was suspect of this welder for heavy stuff, but it performed well on welding some shit rusted footer on this trailer to re attach the partition lock to. I had TL hold and used plastic twine to hold the top part in place as the bottom seemed not so wanting to hold in the first weld, and then went off to cut some metal to brace weld the top part to, and went at it.'
I was welding the light stuff at around 75 amps, burning some holes in the pipe and the brace, but that is part of this in tap welding for like 5 seconds to get some rod melted on top of the lighter stuff, and then you build out from that. I'm a firm believer in melting metal and melting the rod, and not just putting a bead on it, as if you have everything fused, you get a weld that will hold. It is blacksmithing with a welding rod.
I had it up to 115 amps on the heavier stuff in that footing on the second go round and it did a fine job. The one latch was broke off too, so put a piece of metal I found in the old man's stuff, and welded that on carefully as it was heavy, and going to lighter pipe. Still burned a hole, but puddled it over and it all held.
I'm most pleased with this welder. It was worth the 160 for it. Real welders are very expensive now in the Lincolns which I is why I did not have a back up. JYG has a pile of them I found in a trailer with the old electrodes that you plug them into the amp you want like a socket, but I got this Montegomery Ward before I stumbled onto that. Perhaps I might get one of those if he has the electrodes I can wire some cable into as those welders are all JYG uses and he gets things to hold like this Triton.
I still think this Ward will shine on the light stuff which the Lincoln is not really built for as this welder was performing very well on this shitty stock trailer. I still like the Lincoln for major work, but this was pretty major welding and this Wards did a good job, as I doubt anyone reading this is really involved in the kind of stuff I usually am and in most cases would just want an affordable old welder to have in the garage to fix something that broke.
160 bucks to me is still allot of money and I was a bit hesitant in wondering if I bought something I should not have, but this is a good investment and it will save on my back. I might put some bigger tires on it to make pulling it outside easier, but other than that, this collectors item in the long gone past of mail order stores is going to be welding long after Jesus comes back.
Nuff Said
agtG
