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I just want to plug in a welder
Friday, November 30 2007
Today was a deadline day for a web development project, so I spent most of it fixing or slightly-improving little bits and pieces. By the end of the day, Gretchen was down in the city and I was sipping on a gin and tonic and researching electric welding equipment in anticipation of a future purchase. I don't know much about said equipment, other than that it plugs into an outlet and uses electricity to weld, thereby obviating the need for ever-depleting tanks of gas. My major uncertainty about such devices is how much electricity they can be expected to draw. A few manufacturers (particularly Campbell Hausfeld) do publish wall amperage ratings (20 amps is typical for 120 volt welders), but most do not. The only amperages most manufacturers publish are welding amperages, which means the amperage available at the welding electrode, which is dependent on several factors and isn't simply proportional to the outlet amperage.
This is a concern because I don't want to buy a welding kit I cannot use in my shop. The shop is somewhat underpowered for most welding purposes; it has a 220 volt service, but that's on a 30 amp breaker. In the few cases where I have seen posted outlet amperages for 220 volt welders, the amperage has been on the order of 50 amps. I'd like to get a 220 volt welder, but not if it needs 50 amps.
The Clarke Power WE6534 looked like a good 220 volt welding kit, but of course there were no published specs detailing how much current I could expect it to draw. So I called the tollfree hotline, 1-(800)-985-6017, and in seconds was talking to a nice gentleman in an Indian call center (and by this I do not mean he was working on a reservation). This person, however, was of no help. He was not a welding expert and he didn't have any more information than had been published on the web. Gone are the days when you can call the seller of an item and expect him to be an expert on it.
For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?071130 feedback
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