Hello,
I've been having lots of fun with my Fronius Magicwave 230i. The Fronius support team in Milton Keynes HQ is beyond praise too in trying to get to the bottom of a problem I'm having but unfortunately it's still ongoing and I'm out of ideas of what to try to reproduce it, let alone eliminate it all together, which would be great.
The problem.
Started on AC but has now spread to DC. No arc mid way through the weld or when you (re-)start the weld. At first I thought this would be just a matter of scratching the surface with tungsten but it didn't work every time. I'm using a pedal so pushing it down results in gas discharge but no arc. When I say no arc, it's different to no ground - i.e. you don't get electric discharge at all. Just the gas. Haivng had mostly aluminium welding to do during last year I haven't noticed anything odd on DC so after voicing my concerns with Fronius support in Milton Keynes, we focused on testing the AC side of things.
This resulted in: new pedal internals, updated welder software, new machine board, new earth lead, I've bought a couple more torches (CK), swapped collets etc, different grade tungstens and fresh pack of welding wire - practically new setup. All this took a few good months in between of lock downs and I must say at first the results were somewhat promising (less no arc on starts) but as you keep on welding you see that the issue is not gone completely.
Enter this year and more DC welding. No arc starts (rare but still persistent) and no arc in the middle of the weld.
No matter what you try to do with the machine still on (swap out the torch, cycle throught the menu, etc) - once the arc is gone, it's not coming back. The only solution that works 100% of the time is manual reboot of the welder via the ON/OFF button on the back. Which leads me to believe that the issue lies with the welder or its software heavy interface (I did have a feeling I should have bought a "dumb" button only welder from Fronius at the time but it's too late now.)
I'm open to any suggestions as to what I should do at this point. I like the welder but having to deal with this sudden arc disappearance is soul destroying. Especially when the work piles up and dead lines are looming and all you do is continuosly restart the welder to finish the job.
Thanks.
I've been having lots of fun with my Fronius Magicwave 230i. The Fronius support team in Milton Keynes HQ is beyond praise too in trying to get to the bottom of a problem I'm having but unfortunately it's still ongoing and I'm out of ideas of what to try to reproduce it, let alone eliminate it all together, which would be great.
The problem.
Started on AC but has now spread to DC. No arc mid way through the weld or when you (re-)start the weld. At first I thought this would be just a matter of scratching the surface with tungsten but it didn't work every time. I'm using a pedal so pushing it down results in gas discharge but no arc. When I say no arc, it's different to no ground - i.e. you don't get electric discharge at all. Just the gas. Haivng had mostly aluminium welding to do during last year I haven't noticed anything odd on DC so after voicing my concerns with Fronius support in Milton Keynes, we focused on testing the AC side of things.
This resulted in: new pedal internals, updated welder software, new machine board, new earth lead, I've bought a couple more torches (CK), swapped collets etc, different grade tungstens and fresh pack of welding wire - practically new setup. All this took a few good months in between of lock downs and I must say at first the results were somewhat promising (less no arc on starts) but as you keep on welding you see that the issue is not gone completely.
Enter this year and more DC welding. No arc starts (rare but still persistent) and no arc in the middle of the weld.
No matter what you try to do with the machine still on (swap out the torch, cycle throught the menu, etc) - once the arc is gone, it's not coming back. The only solution that works 100% of the time is manual reboot of the welder via the ON/OFF button on the back. Which leads me to believe that the issue lies with the welder or its software heavy interface (I did have a feeling I should have bought a "dumb" button only welder from Fronius at the time but it's too late now.)
I'm open to any suggestions as to what I should do at this point. I like the welder but having to deal with this sudden arc disappearance is soul destroying. Especially when the work piles up and dead lines are looming and all you do is continuosly restart the welder to finish the job.
Thanks.