Arc welder purchase.

The one you are looking at looks very much like a basic transformer machine. Duty cycle is rubbish. It will probably also have quite a high inrush current when you turn it on and if you have mcbs in your distribution board you might trip the circuit its plugged into.
The ESAB ones are great machines providing they dont break. If they do it wil cost you a fortune to get it fixed.
You might want to look at a small inverter machine like a Messer pico or maye a Thermal Arc. These are small light and very portable and will do a 3.2mm rod easily with a good duty cycle.

Alex, check you PM.

pm sent Ian

OK understand, no sweat now. Should have put the rest of the quote in, my bad.

Birchy just noticed you had said that Miller were the Aston Martin of the welding world. That might be but I have never looked at them much. I do remember having to go to a customer years ago who complained that his profiling machine kept on losing position. Arrived at his site to find the machine stuck between two syncrowelds. Everytime they fired up they chucked out so much rf they blasted the cnc controller senseless and it went wandering. Right PITA to fix it was.

I'd recommend getting an inverter, as they make arc welding alot easier.

I've got a small Cebora unit I picked up of ebay several years ago, primarily for TIG, however it now spends most of it's time doing Arc work.
Only issue is, as Web Goblin says, is they are expensive to repair should they go wrong, so I'd suggest a new one with warranty.

As for Clarke bashing, my big MIG welder is clarke, and it's never had any issues other than the woefully undersized torch supplied with it, but that was easily fixed with a new torch. Price wise, the Clarke was the cheapest at the time, can handle 1/2" plate, and it's never given me any troubles, however it is one of their industrial range.
I've used some of their smaller stuff, and it's just as good as any other cheap chinese stuff, but at least Clarke has pretty good parts back-up.

If you ask me i would suggest one like this... oxford stick welder | eBay power delivery on that little oxford will run rings around most things regarding stick welders go. ive got the bigger brother to this and it weld smooth as silk. plus the duty cycle will be alot better than any cheap buzzbox

Picked up my dads welder today, its a clarke 180 turbo, which i,ve had a play about with this morning. Its doing a grand job, so that's me set to start my build as soon as i get my the rest of my metal order through. Thank you all very much for your valuable input, its greatly appreciated.'

alex

Thats great that youve got started.
Post photos. Its the law!!!!

I'll put the odd update up to keep within the law lol