I am not a welder. I am going to do some work on the rear suspension and will have to buy a welder, teach myself to weld and then do the job. I will be welding some plates to the rear subframe and to the body panels under the trunk. I will also have to weld a couple of tabs onto the rear axle housing tubes.
Any suggestions of what type of welder to buy and where it get info on how to weld? Like most everyone else I don't have a bunch of cash to throw around.
Thank you

Yes there are a couple of people on the island that have portable welders but I wouldn't let them weld the bucket of an excavator let alone my car. And it's about time I learned.

A good welder to do what you need to do is $1200+ USA.

http://www.usedvictoria.com/classified-ad/lincoln-Mig-Pak-140-120v-20amp_21166993 here is an example of a welder that should suit your needs. Consider it a minimum. most 110 volt welders are garbage. Both Miller and Lincoln make an ok small welder but they are pushing the limits of what you can do with 110 volts. 220 volts gives a much more stable arc and feed speed is not affected as much when you hit a dirty spot or change positions.(on a 110 volt unit you can hear the wire feed speed go up and down with how much power is being used by the welding process, this makes the weld even worse in bad spots.) 150-200 amps should suit your purposes nicely.

Most welding supply companies will sell you a small mig gas bottle for $180-250. They will refill or exchange the bottle as required for you but you need to shop around to get the best deal. The alternative is to lease a bottle for $70 per year that holds enough gas for you for ten years or more.

Thanks Neill, So you think a MIG is the way to go over stick and tig?. Especially for a novice?

I also think the mig is the gest way to go and I wouldn't go lower than the 140 welder, the stick or tig will need more pratice to weld.

Mig is the easiest to learn for the type of welding you will do. Stick welding has very limited use on cars. Tig welding is more versatile but is more of a specialty ( stainless, cast aluminum ). The mig welder is the workhorse of every automotive bodyshop, muffler shop, and service dept. Set up with .023 wire, 75% argon/25%co2 mix and some instructional videos, you will be welding in no time.

I agree get a 220V MIG. For a home mechanic that wants a welder that will do anything you need it to do, I'd specifically suggest as a bare minimum one of the following...Hobart Handler 190, Lincoln Powermig 180c, or Millermatic 180. Hobart will be the cheapest of the bunch (it's Miller's discount line) but it still gets very good reviews. Biggest difference is the stepped voltages on the Hobart (7 choices), vs infinite voltage on the Lincoln & Miller. But that won't matter much because 7 choices are pretty good...better than many cheaper ones that only offer 4. Millermatic will be the most expensive probably, but it has this a slick "Autoset" feature that takes much of the learning curve away of setting voltage & wire speed and reportedly works pretty well (I haven't personally tried one). Might be worth the little extra cash.

I feel all of those will work well and you can get one new for about $700-1,000ish in the US...not sure about where you're at. I consider those models a minimum and I would not suggest anyone ever go any smaller/cheaper than those. None will include a gas bottle so you'll need to add that cost. And then for your first welding project, you buy some angle iron and build yourself a welding cart out of it to hold your new welder, bottle, and tools. That welding cart will be your welding 101 class...it's a great way to learn and a non-critical part you can do screwed up welds on and not really hurt anything.

I feel you should entirely avoid the 110V units (the link Neil provided above is a 110). I admit they can often work well, but most are VERY easy to exceed duty cycle if you do anything beyond thin sheetmetal, and therefore they'll usually live a short life before burning up a circuit board or something and costing you substantially more in the long run. Do NOT fall into the Harbor Freight trap for a welder. Junk. My other STRONG suggestion is to invest in a decent quality auto-darkening helmet. It makes life soooooo much nicer, will shorten your learning curve, and as a small side benefit it might prevent you from actually going blind. By the time you add all that up (welder, bottle, helmet, some material) I don't see you getting what you probably need for much less than about $1500(new)...but it will be very much a worthwhile expense.

I have a Lincoln 180 110/220 MIG Welder & and a Hypertherm Powermax30 plasma cutter.

If your welding you better have something to cut steel with.

Got the welder on sale for $500 and a barely used P30 for $800.

Then just get your bottle and some supplies and your ready.
MIG came with DVD.

Thanks Guys/Girls, I wanted to get the opinion from those who are working on the same type of projects I am.
Searching for one now.

Wire size is important when working on sheetmetal. I got a good deal on a crap load of .030 wire but it doesn't do me any good for the car because it's too big. .023 is about right. The last thing you want to do it blast a bunch of holes in the work and then spend most of your time trying to fix them. It can be like playing golf sometimes.
And don't believe it if somebody tells you you can use flux core instead of gas. They're lying.

I agree 100% with Firebob. I tried to teach myself with .030 wire but finally purchase some .023 and is way easier to use on sheetmetal. Get some scraps metal in thicknesses close to what you are welding to practice on.

Here is my ₵....

When I got the Redbird back in April, decided I was going to build this car from bottom up, and do it all myself. Bought a HF 180 amp mig welder for $280.00 Did a patch panel on RT fender and fabricated repair on LT fender, and did entire exhaust system. Also have used it for several other shop projects since, has done everything I asked. It is rigged for gas, but have not yet need to do so. When I decided to replace both rear quarters, took the plunge and bought a "budget" plasma cutter from Giant Tech. Paid $425 delivered, 3 year warranty...yep more Chinese crap, but I do not have the means to purchase "name brand" stuff, so here I am. Time will tell if it was good investment or not. I know a lot of guys bang on HF crap, probably for good reason, but I have had the same floor jack, engine hoist I bought 13 years ago that still work as they should. I have a Craftsman tool box, with many HF air tools, chisels, lights, sockets, ect...again, no complaints. I also bought the HF HVLP paint guns, repaired & painted a door for a buddy and the under hood on Redbird, came out way better that expected for 1st attempts, plan to paint whole car when all body work is done. The OP stated he doesn't " have a bunch of cash to throw around."...I understand this. I bought my 1st 'bird 13 years ago, and have good luck with HF crap, I know many others that have not. My advice(you asked), research what you need, dig deep into Google and search for reviews for that item you need, balance out what you can afford and what you can live with....let the bashing begin....Kel

1968 Redbird Restoration Album

I think I'm using 25. Should I go to 23?

Man! This stuff aint cheap Bigchief got it about right, after you buy the welder, the bottles, helmet and other stuff it adds up.

Can't imagine there would be much difference. It's not the size of your wire. It's how you use it!

It would nice to be a little cooler now that I have to weld some Honda sheet metal (Rad support) but my welder will not go any lower than .025 wire and 24 Ga sheet metal. I will give it a try with all the settings low.

What gauge is our SM?

20 or 22 I think. Your Lincoln 180 will do sheetmetal fine with the .025 wire as long as it's MIG (not flux) and you have your welder's polarity is set correctly for gas welding. Instructions for polarity and suggested settings are generally printed right on the inside of the welder's door.

All the cost does add up quick but once you get it all and get started you'll wonder how you ever got along without one. Of course then it's a major tragedy when the bottle runs dry. .023, .025. Not that much difference. I just prefer the 23 for sheetmetal.

Larry, that's what she said.

Well I missed the Christmas sales but KMS Tools has their annual welding month sale coming in Feb.
I discovered there's a lot of differences in 180 machines even from the same brand.
How about the Thermal Arc 3n1 machines, anyone try one? They will have them, Miller and Lincoln all on sale in Feb.

What 3 different operations does it do? I've never seen one. I can imagine a mig/plasma cutter and tig or arc welder all in one. I'll bet it would be great to have though.

The 3 ops are stick/mig/tig.

Relatively new to the market so you won't find a lot of people experienced with them. Found this thread with 7 pages of some good comments and reviews mixed with a bunch of typical on-line forum banter & stupidity. But maybe you'll get something out of it...

http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?60389-Thermal-Arc-Fabricator-181i-mig-tig-stick

They can be perchassed [181i] jor $750 & free delivery in the lower 48. Up here they are $1000. Last year they had the 211i 3n1 dual voltage for $450 off. I will see what price and promotion extras are available at KMS tools. I don't really need the 3n1 feature now but why not? I will need to weld some tabs to the axle housing so the stick may be the way for that.

Why? Welding it outside?

If had a MIG at my disposal, and I wasn't working outside in the wind, I'd choose it every time over a stick. Stick is good for welding farm equipment outside in a tornado. Beyond that application, stick is obsolete, messy, ugly, slow. MIG is so much easier, faster, better looking, and equally strong in the right hands...assuming the welder supplies enough voltage for proper penetration.

Just my thoughts on the subject. Others might vary. But I feel stick is of little or no value on any car part. TIG however could be a useful feature someday, especially if you intend to do any aluminum.

He is right about the axle though. Stick better for that app.

Again I ask why? Very curious. I wouldn't see a reason reach for a stick for that if I had a same-output MIG at my disposal...again unless I couldn't control the shielding gas due to wind.

But I freely admit I'm not an officially "certified" welder so don't have deep technical knowledge of this stuff, and my tech school training is old. I've welded quite a lot over the past 25 years, though...

Why favor stick for an axle perch?

Depends on the power output of the welder

The only use I would have for stick welding would be to weld cast iron which is something I could pay someone else to do for the amount I would ever need done. For doing certified welds on truck frames( comparable to axel spring perches etc.) we are required to have a welder capable of 200 amps @40% duty cycle and .035 wire. Welds done with .023 wire look very nice but did not hold up in destructive testing. For welding tabs on your rear end, some knowledge of the different welds and possible damage to your housing (warpage) should be considered before doing anything.

That makes a lot of sense to me. Thanks for explaining and I probably should have said I would never consider using .023 on an axle...nor using a low amperage or 110V welder. But for the axles/perches found on these cars? I wouldn't hesitate to load my 190 amp 220V welder with standard MIG stuff... .030 ER70S-6 wire and 75/25 AR/CO2, which would provide more than sufficient penetration & strength on a car axle, with more controlled heat compared to stick, to help prevent any warpage, and no risk of slag intrusion.

No doubt it depends on the output of the welder I fully agree. And often times a home user has an old high powered stick welder at his disposal, and just a small 110 MIG for sheetmetal. If these are your choices? YES choose the stick all the way, but that's only for the higher output power of the specific welder that provides better penetration...I'm not chosing it for the method.

But for specific purposes of this discussion...Bluebird is considering chosing a single 3 n 1 welder, which has the same stick output as MIG output. In that scenario I just couldn't fathom choosing stick method over MIG, with all things being equal (as in coming out of same machine with same power output). My biggest point is that I see a 3 in 1 welder as nothing but a 2 in 1 welder...cuz I don't think I'd EVER use the stick feature, again unless I found myself outside on a windy day...but even then I believe I'd just skip the gas and load a spool of flux-core in my wire feed.

Skill of the welder certainly comes into play as well, and maybe someone more comfortable with stick should choose it instead. But anywho this could be debated all day long so I'll stop now. Though I'm certainly intrigued if I'm still overlooking some benefit to using stick in this application and would respect any other input to what I might be overlooking. Sorry to hijack if I did...was not my intent.

Thank you for sharing your opinions, exactly what I asked for and I appreciate the discussion.
As I said, I am not a welder and the more I hear the better. The only welding I've been involved with was tubular steel aircraft frames and engine mounts with oxygen/acetylene being the method of choice. I've had to pay someone to weld for me when needed and if I'd bought a welder and learned how to use it five years ago I would have saved enough to pay for it more than a couple times. I don't have a pal that will come over with a welder and do what I need then have a couple of beers while we talk about cars, so it's about time I learned. Not only for use on my car but all the other machinery I have as well.
I thought the dual voltage may be an advantage just in case I had to use it when there was no access to 220 volts, and the stick/mig feature may be worth an extra hundred bucks, but I still don't want to pay for a feature I may never use. According to the spec sheets the Thermal arc has a higher output than a comparable Miller or Lincoln but I've also learned, the hard way, you generally get what you pay for.
That's why I'm asking and thanks again for the answers.

I'm new to welding, bought a Millermatic 211 last year. I like the autoset, took me very little time to get the hang of it. Once you get a feel for speed and angle, it goes pretty smoothly.

Well I got a Lincoln 180 HP on Monday. It was 160 bucks cheaper than the Miller at KMS. I used the difference to get an adjustable auto darkening helmet. KMS advertised they are a gas fill station and sell tanks but the store in Victoria has been waiting three years to start filling so I didn't get a tank or gas. Any suggestions on how large a cylinder for a casual user? They said the gas place in Victoria only exchanges and only one size. Gotta be someone who will fill whatever size cylinder one has?
The welder specs at 20 amps input but has a 50 amp plug. So did all the other welders I looked at. I was going to cut off the plug and put on a 20 amp but the store said it would void the waranty. I bought 150 amp receptacles for my garage and car port. Now that I got it home I see I should have just rewired it with a 20 amp cable/plug that I could switch if I needed to take it back.
How many units of gas does one use for every hour of welding?

a 4 foot tall bottle lasts us 6 months at work, sometimes doesn't get used for days but probably enough for you for 6 years. We buy from Air Liquide, I have a bottle that I bought for myself from them that's about 2.5 ft. tall that I just exchange when its empty, no refill and I don't have to re-certify the bottle after ten years, it just gets taken care of and no 70 dollar a year lease. I think the other suppliers do the same. Sorry I don't remember how much it costs to exchange.

I have a Lincoln 185 /w gas. Note the size of bottle.

Have a look at how I wired mine. https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/105908860112140983297/albums/5537620816184579281

Gas lasts FOREVER in hobby-only usage. You won't need a huge bottle unless you want to ignore it forever which is convenient. Mine's about the size of my leg I guess....3 ft tall? I don't know the names of the sizes. I think i went 6 or 7 years of occasional usage and a near-full structural rebuild of my Fibird before it finally ran out. Most important IMO to pick a supplier that's convenient, and tha allows direct bottle exchanges. Recert fee will kill you in 10 years if you actually purchase a bottle and it eventually expires. $125 just have have it certified again I think?

Gas never expires so no harm in going too big. But don't waste money on a huge spool of wire if you don't plan to use it up within a year or so. Depending on wher eyou store it I've had entire spools go bad from just taking up humidity in the air over the years. For that reason I favor the small 2 lb spools since it keeps me from tossing them in the trash to avoid contaminated welds if they haze over with a dusting of rust.

Thank you all.
I still can't believe how much info one can get on this site. From welding to carpeting.
I'll keep asking as long as someone keeps answering, even throw my two cents in now and then, which may or may not be worth two cents.

The 3' tall cylinder is 80 CF. The next size up is 125 CF, I think. I borrowed a buddies 125 100 % Argon after using the fluxcore for a short time. I did both 1/4 panels, and several other repairs plus a few little odd & end projects and used about 2/3 of that tank. I went and got an 80 CF off ebay $187 delivered and it came with a 10 year test stamp. I had it filled with C25(75% Argon, 25% Co2). Cost me about $50 to fill it. My welds were better with the C25 than the straight Argon.

80 CF Welding Cylinder

I have, I want to say a 50, maybe an 80 bottle. It should last a hobbiest a long time. I think my regulator has a problem though because if I don't completely shut the valve after every use it will leak out. It's $26 to get re-filled here. Basically just a bottle exchange. I drop mine off and they give me one that's already filled. I think the first one was $75 filled. If it was not really convient to run down and get another I think I'd opt for a bigger bottle. Maybe 4ft tall. It's a drag when you run out and want to do a job.

I can now confirm my bottle is the size of 68Blackbird's after seeing his pic, so I guess that means it's an 80 cfm assuming his comments are correct. Appears my 3 foot guess was about right. Photo of mine is not convenient at the moment.

I also agree that C25 is the gas of choice for MIG welding steel. Argon is incorrect as the CO2 is a very necessary component. Pure Argon is for welding Aluminum, not for steel.

Also agree with Firebird's comments...always close the main valve on the bottle when not in use. You don't want to rely on your regulator holding back 1600 psi or whatever these bottles are in long term storage...I believe most will seep very slowly and undetected.

OK,let me throw my 2-cents in.
I find that using staight 100% CO2 on sheet metal works best for me. I get slightly less penatration (not a problem on sheet metal) but less spatter and and a flatter weld than with the CO2/Argon mix.