I know, that's what I reckoned. I could easily spend £250 on a welder that takes a long time to master and doesn't perform that well. I think I am more likely to press on with the restoration if the welding isn't frustrating. Plus, I could sell the Portamig afterwards if necessary.
It is a lot of outlay but would getting someone to do a decent job for you cost more than a Portamig 185? The job I am doing at the moment will recover most of the outlay for my 215 and I have already built myself a fully adjustable chassis dolly to make life easier with the Autovip car roller I have.
12 months on and the machine has done everything asked of it. Gave the machine a going over, blew the dust out, checked everything is tight and searched for gas leaks. The only problem found was a small leak on the PVC tube connecting to the wirefeed unit so replaced the PVC with silicon tube for a better seal on the hose barb.