How to choose a welding machine

It should be noted that inexpensive models of such devices, regardless of brand, are manufactured in China. The reliability and durability of such welding machines, as a rule, leave much to be desired. Therefore, it is best to choose the devices manufactured in Europe or Japan.

To choose the right welding machine, the first thing you should pay attention to is: Welding current adjustment range. For domestic needs usually enough for 160-200 A.

Also, attention should be paid to duration of activation (MF). When using high currents, the machine canoverheat and shut down to cool down. For example, at PV = 20%, you can keep the arc at the maximum current for 2 minutes out of 10. The rest of the time is necessary for "resting" the device. In practice, when trying to burn several electrodes in a row, a protection is triggered, and the inverter turns off for a few minutes.

If you work at a lower current, the welding machinecan be operated almost without interruption. However, this need does not arise, because in the welding process you will need to inspect the resulting seams, change the electrodes and so on. Still need to pay attention to the no-load voltage. The higher it is, the better. This voltage can vary from 50 to 90 V.

As for the delivery set of welding machines, it usually includes wires and mask, which is often not very convenient and does not work for serious work. Therefore, we recommend buying a mask separately. Convenient if included in the kit special briefcase, designed to store and carry the inverter. The inverter itself must have beltso that the device can be hung on the shoulder while working.

Separately need to tell on the protection of welding machines from moisture and dust. The inverter, as a rule, has protection class IP21 (from large particles and rain drops). Also sometimes comes the class IP23 (from oblique rain). but Safety rules for welding in the rain are prohibited., because due to the ingress of moisture inside the inverterhe can simply burn. The same applies to dust. The greatest danger is metal dust, so do not work with a Bulgarian near the welding machine.

The power consumption of the device should be within 4-8 kW. This will be enough to connectwelding machine in a normal household network. However, it should be remembered that the electricity consumption of the inverter is much higher than that of an electric kettle or a light bulb.

Before selecting a welding machine, it is first necessary deal with the question of maintainability this or that model. Be sure to specify the addresses of repair shops. If the repair of the device is possible only in a workshop that is located at a considerable distance from the place of operation of the device, such a device does not make sense to buy and it is worth considering purchasing another model.

Finally it is worth noting that many modern welding machines have a number of additional functions. For example, the function Hot Start facilitates arc arcing due to an increase in the initial current. Arc Force is needed to prevent sticking of the electrode to the part. A function Anti-Stick reduces the current to tear off the electrode in case of sticking.