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Cant strike an arc with my arc welder...

2K views 11 replies 7 participants last post by  GiantTechGuy 
#1 · (Edited)
I have an older Century 220v 230a arc welder. I bought it about a month ago. It came with no plug, so I bought a 6' dryer cord and wired it up. Worked fine last month. I burned several rods with it just to test it out. Yesterday I went to use it to weld a spring hanger on my truck, and I could not for the life of me get it to start an arc. It will spark but no arc. The metal was nice and shiny. I also tried it on a piece of scrap metal, still wouldnt work. And it just might be my immagination, but the fan seems to be running slow. I am a beginner arc welder, but last month I was able to run some good beads with only a little bit of trouble starting the arc. I'm using ES6011 rods.


Also, the amperage selector seems to want to jam up sometimes. I have to wiggle it to get it to move up and down. Maybe that has something to do with it? I'm going to pop the case off of it after work today and look around. Anything I should check? Any common problems with these older arc welders? Thanks!
 
#2 ·
You might try some new rod it may be damp. Sounds like time to remove the cover and get some contact cleaner in to the contacts., but it may be the rod. You can throw the rod in an over to heat and dry the rod. or leave out in the sun.
 
#4 ·
I have an older Century 220v 230a arc welder. I bought it about a month ago. It came with no plug, so I bought a 6' dryer cord and wired it up. Worked fine last month. I burned several rods with it just to test it out. Yesterday I went to use it to weld a spring hanger on my truck, and I could not for the life of me get it to start an arc. It will spark but no arc. The metal was nice and shiny. I also tried it on a piece of scrap metal, still wouldnt work. And it just might be my immagination, but the fan seems to be running slow. I am a beginner arc welder, but last month I was able to run some good beads with only a little bit of trouble starting the arc. I'm using ES6011 rods.


Also, the amperage selector seems to want to jam up sometimes. I have to wiggle it to get it to move up and down. Maybe that has something to do with it? I'm going to pop the case off of it after work today and look around. Anything I should check? Any common problems with these older arc welders? Thanks!
You might try some new rod it may be damp. Sounds like time to remove the cover and get some contact cleaner in to the contacts., but it may be the rod. You can throw the rod in an over to heat and dry the rod. or leave out in the sun.
Cellulose coverings for E6010 and E6011 electrodes need moisture levels of 3% to 7% for proper operation; therefore, storage or conditioning above ambient temperature may dry them too much and adversely affect their operation. 6010 and 6011 will even run soaking wet so I would be checking the power feed to the machine to make sure that is getting ~230V both externally and internally as many transformer based machines will run on 115V with the OCV and arc voltages at half of what they were designed for.
 
#5 ·
OK, I got it figured out. Once I pulled the case off, I realized I had it wired wrong :mad: :p :D Wired it up right and it works great!

Now I can burn my spring hanger on!

There was a bunch of white substance of some kind built up on the amperage selector rod. Is this some kind of lube, or corrosion?
 
#11 ·
Those things covered with white mystery grease are made from iron. The moving iron is what varies the transformer output. There isnt any electrical contact going on like a variable tap transformer. Since it's magnetism and not electricity moving through the bars, any kind of high-temperature grease should be suitable. That transformer gets pretty hot during operation, so use a grease rated for high-temperatures and use it sparingly (or it will drip all over the bottom of the machine and make a mess when it's heated). Sorry I'm not better at explaining the theory behind "moving iron" transformers, but in a nutshell: the sliding iron bars are what's gotta move to vary the amperage on the welder.

When you are squeezing the lever in the front it should pull the threaded rod and compress that spring allowing the iron bars to move up/down.
You can see there is a nut at the end of the threaded rod to that goes through the spring to adjust tension. When that spring is extended it "jams" the two bars so they cant slide. When you squeeze the lever on the front of the machine it squeezes the spring to "unjam" the bars to let them slide up and down. The actual mechanism is pretty simple and cheap to make, which is probably why the mfg. chose it.

Adjust the pull-rod nut so the the the spring compresses enough to where it isn't trying to spread the two bars apart when you squeeze the lever in the front. There only needs to be enough spring tension to hold the sliding iron bars in place when the lever is released.

The only contact switch on your machine is the on/off switch. Everything else should last forever unless you somehow manage get the machine hot enough to melt the lacquer insulation off the transformer windings.
 
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