Have recently bought myself a little mig machine for occasional home use. Just going to be used for the odd trailer repair job e.t.c. The amount of times I will be using it does not really justify a boc rental. I see on here traders are advertising 5kg co2 cylinders for mig shielding gas. Does anyone have any first hand experience using co2? Seems as though its cheap enough?
berg,
Sep 9, 7:20pm
I use it. Not quite as good as argoshield but for basic home type welding it is fine
ladatrouble,
Sep 9, 8:52pm
I can't afford an argoshield bottle for home use, so had an alloy dive bottle retested and use that. It's not as good as argoshield and has a different look, but for use at home is good enough.
johotech,
Sep 9, 9:17pm
Is it a gas/gasless machine? Gasless works fine for most jobs.
Or if you really want a CO2, check with cylinder testing companies. They sometimes have cylinders for sale.
sr2,
Sep 9, 9:52pm
Co2 it fine for mig; the only downside is a little more spatter than argoshield, which is easily controlled with a can of CRC anti spatter spray or a lick with a sanding disc on the angle grinder.
Best value for money is to use a Co2 extinguisher bottle; I use Nova Fire Safety Services in St Mary's Bay for my fills, they originally supplied the correct adapt or to fit my regulator and they sell 2nd hand bottles, great bunch of guys.
BOC charge like a wounded bull and their service is rubbish, I'd avoid them like the plague.
socram,
Sep 10, 12:55am
Useful thread and advice! My small cheapo MiG welder seems to be useless gasless, as purchased, (could also be operator problems) but there is a nozzle for a shielding gas - which the retailer didn't sell.
intrade,
Sep 10, 1:05am
i had one of them gasless . would only weld bird craps and then the wire would not even feed gasless wire in the end. telwin crap or something it was .
sifty,
Sep 10, 1:19am
I have a disposable argon/co2 mix bottle, but haven't tried it yet.
Same situation, gasless fine 90% of the time but want to do some panel work so looking fwd to trying it out.
ambo11,
Sep 10, 2:58am
Got an own your own 5kg cylinder off here for $300 a year or two back, co2, costs $30 to fill, brilliant. Go for it.
laspaz,
Sep 10, 3:06am
+1, I have the same, works out far cheaper than the disposable bottles. They only seem to last 5 or 10 minutes and cost heaps.
skin1235,
Sep 10, 5:44am
soda stream bottles last about 15-20 minutes each, cost $8 to refill at our local agent
mk3zephyr,
Sep 10, 11:46am
CO2 is fine as a sheilding gas with hard wire, like was mentioned earlier you get a bit more spatter which a can of anti spatter will fix, Like anything the more you use it the better you will get at it, I use it on my Mig and you cant tell any difference now. Failing that you could always use flux core wire which uses CO2 anyway, just have to reverse polarity.
marte,
Sep 10, 12:06pm
If your welder has a proper solienoid gas valve. Then use the gas if you want.
If the valve is a hand operated sort, use gasless, I found they leak too much gas.
I have only used them a couple of times. I have spent years on the end of a 400 amp, Ali, fluxcore or solid wire MIG though.
But, I was really impressed with the gasless wire setup on a Telwin welder. Almost invisable welds, great for prepping, or tacking, a weld together.
Its all about the way you set it all up though. The main thing is to have good contact between the tip and the wire. To do that you cannot let the wire get kinked or squashed by the rollers, and the liner must let the wire thru easyely.
To 'feel' that. Unclip your rollers, use pliers to pull some of the wire out of the tip and feel how it moves thru. The set your rollers, tighten up the rollers untill you can grab the wire before the rollers with your finger and thumb tight, and it will slow down the wire and make it slip a bit in the rollers. At that point of tightness, the rollers will not put 'flats' on your wire. Make sure of that. 'Flats' on the wire screw up the electrical contact between it and the tip and if it grabs there, it kinks the wire right up the liner and puts flats on the wire again, and so on it goes.
This goes X100 if you are welding with Ali wire. Which is beautiful when its welding right. Amazing actually.
geordiemotors,
Jun 6, 10:01am
C02 is good, have done a lot of panel repairs etc with it. Its cheaper and no contract needed for bottle.
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