China Mig Welder Upgrade

[volkswagenvan]

I had this Mig wire feed welder for around seven years now and just got around to taking it out of the box! ( Gifted )
Having welded for years, I decided to give this Cheap little China 110V welder a try.

After fixing many bad solder joints it came alive! Lol

I hooked up a tank of CO2 and gave it a try on some scrap steel. It works but it is far from a Lincoln or Miller welder. Lol

Looking at the schematic I saw that the wire feed motor got its power from the welders output. Same power creating the arc.
Kind of hard to keep a steady feed rate when the supply voltage to the little feed motor is constantly changing due to arc voltage bouncing!

After Drawing out this circuit so that I could understand it,... It got a separate 24V transformer and bridge rectifier upgrade.
It welds smoother and is now usable but is still a Cheap China welder.

Here is my stock drawing of the circuit and a picture of the Pcb it got drawn from.
Hope it Helps someone!
2.bmp (723.05 KB)1.bmp (1023.79 KB)

[retiredat55]

Nicely done!!

[volkswagenvan]

This is what it came with to work off of.

[retiredat55]

You did realy a fine job with this!
But did you need this welder anyway?

[volkswagenvan]

Hi Dante,

I find that being retired is giving me to much time in the winter months so I have decided to do some body work on a few pickup trucks to pass the time.
This is why I got this little welder for in the first place!

Body work is not new to me but welding repair panels with a small portable welder would be kind of cool! I always thought that anyways.

My big wire feed is kind of stationary and you have to bring the project to it. Lol

Where I live in the USA we use salt to melt the ice and snow off the roads in the winter and a brand new truck will have rust holes within about five years.
I always tried to keep my vehicles looking presentable but it`s not easy. Rust is the cancer that kills cars and trucks around here!

[retiredat55]

See pm