After pondering and prevaricating for months I picked up a used one of these last night.
ERFI Welder
Mine is the 170A version. It set me back £100 spares or repair, thought it was worth a punt. The seller said both control knobs were broken off but the machine fed & arced.
Did a bit of investigation today, spot weld control can still be turned, just not enough stem left to retain the knob. Wire speed stem is flush but you can just manage to turn it with a small screwdriver.
Once I'd sorted out the plug (only the live wire was adequately secured, the screw in the neutral terminal was missing and the earth wire was doing it's own thing) I hooked it up to gas and fired it up. Initially no wire feed until I tweaked the speed control, then it was fine.
Main problem was although there was an arc the weld wouldn't trouble my SIP in a penetration battle It feels like there's no power, regardless of the voltage selected, although you can detect a difference as you go up the range. Sounds like the rectifier? Torch needs a service and looks like it may have 1.0mm contact tip in although it's 0.8 wire. Is it worth doing a torch service first to make sure it's not that?
Assuming the rectifier is at fault what's the best way to test it?
If I'm looking for open circuit diodes presumably the others in parallel will mask the faults unless I dismantle it.
Rectifier looks very much like this,
EBAY Rectifier
Would like to prove the fault before ordering up replacement parts.
Should be able to sort out wire speed control myself, looks an easy job to de-solder and change for a new one. Contactor (on main PCB) looks like it's got a bit hot so may change it as a preventative measure.
Hopefully will be able get a quality machine for the price of a new Clarke at the end of this exercise?
All advice apreciated
Thanks
Sean
ERFI Welder
Mine is the 170A version. It set me back £100 spares or repair, thought it was worth a punt. The seller said both control knobs were broken off but the machine fed & arced.
Did a bit of investigation today, spot weld control can still be turned, just not enough stem left to retain the knob. Wire speed stem is flush but you can just manage to turn it with a small screwdriver.
Once I'd sorted out the plug (only the live wire was adequately secured, the screw in the neutral terminal was missing and the earth wire was doing it's own thing) I hooked it up to gas and fired it up. Initially no wire feed until I tweaked the speed control, then it was fine.
Main problem was although there was an arc the weld wouldn't trouble my SIP in a penetration battle It feels like there's no power, regardless of the voltage selected, although you can detect a difference as you go up the range. Sounds like the rectifier? Torch needs a service and looks like it may have 1.0mm contact tip in although it's 0.8 wire. Is it worth doing a torch service first to make sure it's not that?
Assuming the rectifier is at fault what's the best way to test it?
If I'm looking for open circuit diodes presumably the others in parallel will mask the faults unless I dismantle it.
Rectifier looks very much like this,
EBAY Rectifier
Would like to prove the fault before ordering up replacement parts.
Should be able to sort out wire speed control myself, looks an easy job to de-solder and change for a new one. Contactor (on main PCB) looks like it's got a bit hot so may change it as a preventative measure.
Hopefully will be able get a quality machine for the price of a new Clarke at the end of this exercise?
All advice apreciated
Thanks
Sean