Welding machines

Well those of us who weld could use my misfortune for their benefit. I have 2 Lincoln 210MP welders at my shop one set up for carbon steel and the other for stainless and aluminum. The first design had problems with the board and was warranty repaired in the first year the second I bought to use while I waited for the first to be repaired. The second lost the board after 18 months ( also under warranty). The first went out (primary machine) 30 months later. Now out of warranty the board $1080 from Lincoln. I sent it to my supplier who checked and confirmed what it needed and just had him return it.
Well in frustration I tried my Google fu to find a fix. Turns out the bridge rectifier is the culprit. I then learned how to test the component on the board and took the machine apart. Well three wrong parts off the internet and five days on the bench and a local electrical supply run I have replaced the bad part with one about three times the thermal capacity but the same voltage and a 5 amp higher capacity.
The machine is up and running again.
So how does that help you?
A 210MP is a $1500 to $2000 machine used and about $2500 plus accessories new.
Not working from 100 to 500 and I found one with a foot pedal and tig torch upgrade for $500 this morning.
Any member who wants a welder capable of mig tig and stick with the contactors for a spool gun look locally for a deal and I’ll share the information to fix it parts will be less than $20 and I even took pictures.

Lincoln products were absolute top-shelf 40 years ago. Now they are absolute garbage.

I'm a true blue Miller guy myself, and all my stuff (200A Mig, 50A Plazma) is easily 25 years old and still works top notch. The shop is all Lincoln so I was messing with a SquareWave200 TIG (auto-set) today for a quick repair to the aluminum dash mount on the Ninja. Not nearly impressed. My cheap-O APH 210 manual TIG welds circles around it

I have a friend that took a chance on one of those Chinese Lazer welders. $15K is a BIG chance but WOW it's a wild machine. They do stuff well, other stuff not, but damn if they do what they say crazy good! The future is here.

On the road we have also bought those little Harbor Freight MIG welder before. They are cheap enough to leave behind, and light enough the feel like a display box! Pretty impressed by them as well for light duty (1/8" or less) hobby work.

I have had good luck with the bigger industrial Lincoln machines but DC 600 machines are not very portable and my Ln 25 is huge to weld exhaust pipe with.
Cooter what was the issue with the tig 200? Actually poor performance or just crap auto settings. I am shopping for a square wave and wanted it to be about that size.

Barrett, the 210MP welds beautifully is lightweight enough to carry and the 110/220 input is really convenient. A Miller or Esab may be better but I will deal with the devil I know for now.

Miller hit a home run with the XMT machines too bad they didn’t design them themselves. I really like my PowCon power supply, I would have bought an XMT at the time that I was looking but the 25 year old PowCon fell in my lap for $200.
Knowing that Miller bought PowCon years earlier and then put out the first of the XMT shortly after with the same capacity and features. Hmmm.

Barrett said:

Lincoln products were absolute top-shelf 40 years ago. Now they are absolute garbage.

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The demise of the Lincoln quality reputation was the introduction of the home store line of machines. They produced plastic dirve assemblies and cheaper internal components and the cases looked like the welding supply machine. I made that mistake buying one about 1997/8 then using it had warranty issues right away and went to a welding supply that was a Lincoln repair shop and they schooled me on why the on on their shelf was about twice the money as the home store or walmart version. Lincoln makes several versions of their home store machines. Well several labels at one store Mig 140 at another Mig 135 ut the spec sheet is identical. They do that for tracking and so customers can’t work one seller against another for “price matching” we will beat anyone else’s price by 10 percent on any IDENTICAL item.

Cooter said:

I'm a true blue Miller guy myself

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That’s a different kind of Miller.