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Thread: Transmig 172

  1. #1
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    Default Transmig 172

    I've been gifted a unimig 172.
    It needs a bit of a tidy up (the work lead has about 10 strands connected at the clamp, about 9 inside) but that ought to be straight forward.
    Is this a good unit? How much effort is it worth, if say it needed a new gun and lead? (I'm sure it's way better than my sip gasless)..20201012_101824.jpg
    20201012_101844.jpg
    Last edited by russ57; 20th Oct 2020 at 06:05 PM. Reason: Pictures..., correct model.

  2. #2
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    Quote Originally Posted by russ57 View Post
    I've been gifted a unimig 172.
    ...
    Is this a good unit? How much effort is it worth, if say it needed a new gun and lead?
    I'm glad you didn't pay for it, because it's not.
    Other than re-terminating the copper and lugs inside the machine, repair would be false economy.

    I wouldn't waste time with a step control machine in this day and age. Especially not a 20 year old one.

  3. #3
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    Cannot really go along with those comments.
    Had mine 20 years and its still going strong.
    With the flux falling off my stick rods(their that old) and no gas for the other mig or tigs this is currently my only welder.
    As much as I hate flux core that along with this welder has done well from .8 mm up to 6mm. over the last 12 months.
    Would I go and spend a lot of money on it if it fails. No, but a few dollars on cable lugs and maybe a new liner not a problem.

    Tony

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    Quote Originally Posted by Commander_Keen View Post
    I'm glad you didn't pay for it, because it's not.
    Other than re-terminating the copper and lugs inside the machine, repair would be false economy.

    I wouldn't waste time with a step control machine in this day and age. Especially not a 20 year old one.
    Possibly a bit harsh in your assessment there. The 172 certainly is not a pro grade machine, nor does it pretend to be, but it will certainly be a quantum leap from the SIP gassless currently in use. A lot of people "waste their time" with stepped machines every day in industry without complaint.
    As far as repairs to the old girl go, I would definitely re terminate/replace leads as required, replace liners as required, I'd probably throw a new gun at it if required at some point and I'd consider replacing diodes if they blew. More than that would be spending more than was reasonable. Older welders generally keep alive pretty well (just look at the number of Transmig 195's still out there).

  5. #5
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    Yeah it's harsh, but I'm a realist. A new machine at that level would be what, $400? They don't make them to be repaired, no matter whose name is on the front of it.

    Assume ALL it needs is 2 new lugs for that 16mm^2 cable. Or let's go all out and do the other ends too- That's probably $10-$15 of lugs retail. Cable burnt, or no longer long enough to work? Buy a new one and add $30. No suitable tool for cutting thin strand copper flex cable - that's a $40 set of cable cutters. Planning to Crimp the lugs? Cabac lug crimps will set you back a couple of hundred, might get a cheap ratcheting pair of crimpers for $50. OR go the solder route- BYO MAPP gas or butane torch (hope ya got one!) plus solder. So worst case that would be a $100 fix. Less if you have the tools and parts handy, however most won't.

    A deeper repair/renew might look at Liners, a new gun, or some sort of electrical problem.
    A liner might be hard to track down, not a standard style in those fixed torch models, the last I looked at was crimped in the gun body and was a bit how-ya-going. You might be able to mod a binzel or tweco liner for about $20 bucks, but will have to hack it to make it work.
    New gun? No chance. However you might be able to source a new non genuine tweco/binzel style trigger for $10 on a good day. If the torch cable is rooted, you'd have no luck.

    Something broken on the control boards? Probably no support left for a machine of that vintage- I'd be surprised if there is.
    Don't have the electrical knowledge to fix it yourself? Well there's the better part of $150 an hour for someone skilled to look at it and diagnose... keeping in mind a fix may not be possible. Remember a machine can be FUBAR'd without having visibly burnt components...

    And after all that ginning about you've probably spent a good amount of time making good a not-so-good machine.

    As for industry using stepwise machines like that... All I'll say is they are not leveraging the fast-evolving welding technology that is out there, and the type of business that sinks into obscurity or is no longer relevant probably has the same mindset that would consider a machine like that to be a viable production tool. I've seen so many others out there who are happy to make do with old cumbersome technology, and most of the time it's because they don't know any better.

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by Commander_Keen View Post
    As for industry using stepwise machines like that... All I'll say is they are not leveraging the fast-evolving welding technology that is out there, and the type of business that sinks into obscurity or is no longer relevant probably has the same mindset that would consider a machine like that to be a viable production tool. I've seen so many others out there who are happy to make do with old cumbersome technology, and most of the time it's because they don't know any better.
    Yeah I have no idea why WIA are still selling those Fabricators, old antique stepwise technology, what are they thinking?

    https://www.revolutionindustrial.com...IaAmmGEALw_wcB

    In many applications a multi process invertor based machine is not required unless they are working with specialised materials such as Aluminium and Stainless steel that requires pulse.

  7. #7
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    I was going to use the fabricator example... but thought I might rustle too many jimmies by naming names! Blimey, you can get a pretty nice modern machine loaded with some neat tech for the $6K price tag of he fabricator too...

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    Quote Originally Posted by Commander_Keen View Post
    I was going to use the fabricator example... but thought I might rustle too many jimmies by naming names! Blimey, you can get a pretty nice modern machine loaded with some neat tech for the $6K price tag of he fabricator too...
    What modern machine would you recommend for $6K ?

  9. #9
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    My current home machine is a EWM pico 180 Pulse. Great little machine.
    Elsewhere I've used the EWM Phoenix 350 which is a 3 phase machine but was able to belt alloy jobs out of the park. That's around the money for that unit. Prior to that Alloy jobs were turned away... we reckon it paid for itself in the first job, although the boss was a bit tight lipped. Dialled in the hot start, pulse settings crater fill and it was sweet as.

    Before I've used unimig, Kemppi, BOC, and some others.
    A 'good' machine in a fabrication environment will pay for it self with a half competent operator. I rate the EWM for what it is even comes in a bit cheaper than a similar spec Miller Lincoln Fronius Kemppi lorch etc.

  10. #10
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    Did a job yesterday with a mate teaching his young lad to weld. We were using and old BOC 250- the ones that were an old 1990's vintage Kemppi. Stepwise.
    As it always happens, got there and someone had been rootin' about with the dials, had a heap of burnback and wasn't welding for crap, and I had to go back to first principles to get it dialled in by ear on a test plate.
    It wasn't the best way to teach, because all the useful info you want for welding is absent on a stepwise machine. you can't teach based off volts and wire speed, and their relationship between each other through spray globular and short circuit transfer within a wire size. This is one reason to consider a modern machine when welding, as the hardest part of MIG welding is getting the machine set up- which is a challenge without enough data to know what parameters you are actually modifying!
    In this instance coarse and fine voltage steps are just arbitrary measures. Wire speed is the same. They were built this way when old tech necessitated taps coming off a transformer coil, and a big rotary switch to move between these voltage taps/steps.

    In my thoughts, using a stepwise machine is similar to asking one of the machinist types here to give up their dial indicator, and start using one which measures in apples oranges and pears (or some other useless scale)... it will make no sense to anyone unless you are comparing a number of samples using the one tool- and even then, the results you get are not transferrable across tools (there is no easy way to know how many 'pears' might equal 1mm).

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