Hi Greg, when I built my own stinger custom cable setup, I have used AWG 2 wire. That was maybe a little bit on the high current capability side. However, on the other hand, the stinger with its Dinse connector will work on any standard welder, whatever that may be in the future. Thanks for pointing out the importance of the heat resistance cable shield. Cheers.
It’s never a bad thing to have slightly too big of power cables, especially because you can always swap them like you said. Definitely thinking ahead 😀
Thank you for this - I just went through this last week, sizing for my 200A (60%) welder. I went 25mm2 for the 5m length I needed. I usually use a 2.5mm with 3.15mm max rod so for me that seems OK? I hate that when you buy a machine (even a fairly decent one) they give you such short cables - my earth is literally 1.5m (tip of clap to tip of Dinse) Crazy!
No problem 😀. So 25mm cables will handle 180 amps at 30+ percent duty cycle. You could run those 3.2mm rods all day without any real issue so you’re good to go. Short ground cables are fairly common with machines, but that is shorter than most. It makes sense if the machine is super small and 140amp but a 200 amp machine should definitely have longer wires lol.
On the cheaper machines, often hear it said "throw away the junk ground clamp and buy a new one". If the clamp that came with the machine works, what would make an aftermarket clamp work better electrically?
So many ground clamps on very cheap welders have poor spring pressure and they have aluminum wires connecting the jaws. If the ground clamp heats up (due to poor ability to handle power) or doesn’t maintain ground obviously there will be issues. The one on the harbor freight welder is ok, one like I showed on my miller would be better. The stinger is a must upgrade though, the stock one gets hot and has poor clamping pressure for rods.
I believe I was referring to how non flexible cables end up hurting your wrist because you have to fight the tension of the cable. Tig is especially bad because you need very precise control over the tungsten and if you’re fighting the cable to move your wrist it’s very difficult to move properly. It adds weight to the torch, resistance to movement, and if you have carpal tunnel it becomes painful after a while.
Many people claim the small inexpensive HONE 110 volt stick welder is a great deal for $80 shipped. I have read that the unit used copper clad aluminum wire for its cables. Would such a low priced unit greatly benefit to changing the cables to all copper , or would it not be worth the effort ?
So I own the hone 140 amp 110/220 stick welder. It does have copper clad wires. Switching to straight copper will likely change how it welds slightly. The more resistance the wire has the more voltage drop happens. You can actually test this yourself. If you have a voltage tester it’s easy. Set the machine to weld at say 100 amps. Make a weld while someone probes the wire close to the welder watching the voltage. Then check the voltage near the stinger. If there is a huge difference in the voltages the wire is a restriction and going to bigger or solid copper wires will help. If the voltage drop is significant it can make it difficult to keep a arc lit and will cause the wires to heat up. You can also use a ohm meter and meter out the cable end to end to determine resistance. With that number you can calculate probable issues with higher amperage. Also regarding the hone welders, the one I have is ok. It’s setpoints are way off (it’s accurate at 90 amps and that is it). They claim it will run 6010 but it doesn’t. For the 100$ shipped I spent it was worth it but it’s far from a precision tool lol.
@@makingmistakeswithgreg do you think it is even worth replacing the HONE cables with pure 4 gauge copper wire that is only 5 foot long, compared to the copper coated aluminum leads that are 8 foot long ? Im wondering if the improvement seen in welding performance is worth spending a extra $30 for pure copper 4 gauge cables
@@davehimlin2374 honestly I don’t think it would be worth it. The 140 amp unit I have welds good enough with the cables it has that I don’t think they are closing anything back 😀
I got in the habit of color coding wires because when you have multiple leads and extensions it’s far easier to figure things out than if everything was just black. One to many times I hooked up the leads in the wrong polarity 😅
Great question. Easiest way is to cut the end of the cable and look at the end of the bare copper. Solid copper will be copper colored all the way through. Copper clad aluminum will have silver dots in the center of each strand, or (on a even cheaper end) only the outside of the bundle of wires will have copper on it and the whole inside will be silver.
Not only do they do that, but they use CCA (copper clad aluminum) wire which might be 4ga, but because it’s aluminum it only handles the current of 6 or 8ga copper. Pretty sad how much rip off stuff is out there with wire.
