New user with Cosmo 170 (SIP) and a headache

[Tray]

Bugger!
Big fingers little touchscreen.
Question is PWM mod (want to do things the hard way over getting a machine that just works with less input from perverted me, for now!). I like a steep learning curve.
Pulse Width Modulation for speed control, is it better than analogue to control my wire feed considering I can get my hands on 230 A/C-24 DC linear variable for cheap/free.
I know my adjustments won’t be linear due to torque motor efficiency etc...
No lose situation atm with trying stuff to see if it works.
Like I said the learn the hard way(perverted as others have said)is my thing.
By the way Red Stripe and Double Vodka n Red Bulls are in full flow atm

 

[BChild]

Bugger!
Big fingers little touchscreen.
Question is PWM mod (want to do things the hard way over getting a machine that just works with less input from perverted me, for now!). I like a steep learning curve.
Pulse Width Modulation for speed control, is it better than analogue to control my wire feed considering I can get my hands on 230 A/C-24 DC linear variable for cheap/free.
I know my adjustments won’t be linear due to torque motor efficiency etc...
No lose situation atm with trying stuff to see if it works.
Like I said the learn the hard way(perverted as others have said)is my thing.
By the way Red Stripe and Double Vodka n Red Bulls are in full flow atm

Honestly and having slide down the slippery slope of a razor blade with my balls as brakes - bin the cosmo - chalk it down to experience and buy something that gives more pleasure than pain

Experience is what you get when you don't want it

 

[wacky7791]

first welder was a SIP 150 which brought me to this site cos I just couldn't seem to get the knack of welding. did every mod possible to it, brace, seperate PSU, replaced the wire feed PCB with a PWM board, just ended up thinking welding was beyond my abilities.
threw it at a certified welder friend and asked them to show me how to weld with it, and they struggled with it too.
sold it and bought an old workshop mig and whilst I'm still no expert the difference is night and day. just glad I didn't give up on it due to that damn SIP!

 

[BChild]

PS I'm a gin fan but there is not enough gin in the world that would make me want to try to improve my COSMO further

My portamig - I sold my soul for it but it was worth it - I can guess the settings needed to weld pretty much anything within it's capabilities and not need to tweak the settings for perfection because my guess was good enough

In 35 years of cocking around with old cars it is the best tool I have ever bought because it doesn't confuse me

I'm sure there are modern invertor welders that are miles better now but I don't care I can leave it in the garage for months and then turn it one spark it into life and I can glue metal very nicely with 100% guess on settings

 

[BChild]

first welder was a SIP 150 which brought me to this site cos I just couldn't seem to get the knack of welding. did every mod possible to it, brace, seperate PSU, replaced the wire feed PCB with a PWM board, just ended up thinking welding was beyond my abilities.
threw it at a certified welder friend and asked them to show me how to weld with it, and they struggled with it too.
sold it and bought an old workshop mig and whilst I'm still no expert the difference is night and day. just glad I didn't give up on it due to that damn SIP!

You know what that pretty much sums up my feelings

I got taught to weld at college - MIG TIG Gas and Arc - I could do the lot - the cosmo had me thinking I had learnt nothing and knew nothing

 

[Tray]

Man I should be a paramedic, talk about bringing things back to life.....
I read the Jasic/Sherman thread with interest, anyone tried any Andeli machines?
They have lots of their own videos on YouTube but I can’t find any independent reviews.
Yeah I read Sherman TIG is supposedly a Polish knock off/differently badged Jasic at a 1/3 of the price possibly without the C/S but what about their other machines.
A bit of a cynic, do they just do 1 quality copy to make their name and the rest all money makers but basically poor machines?
Sorry peeps you are getting the drunk questions I would normally ask in the pub.
I do think the answeres will be more reliable though.
Is there a purely social part of this forum?

 

[Tray]

Thanks for the replies.
Unfortunately you all seem to think my brother and ole man are right and not just really bad teachers.
The unfortunate part of that being I have to swallow my pride and accept that they did know what they were talking about when they couldn’t teach me to use my Cosmo MIG machine either, and were not just trying to tell me I was crap. (Long history of competition about everything, no holds barred).
I will have to apologise to them for me thinking this way, especially after learning now(book wise at least)that my ole man was very skillfull to be repairing my rusty exhausts on my old Cortinas and escorts with a ole stick welder.
I honestly am now completely humbled.

 

[wacky7791]

Man I should be a paramedic, talk about bringing things back to life.....
I read the Jasic/Sherman thread with interest, anyone tried any Andeli machines?
They have lots of their own videos on YouTube but I can’t find any independent reviews.
Yeah I read Sherman TIG is supposedly a Polish knock off/differently badged Jasic at a 1/3 of the price possibly without the C/S but what about their other machines.
A bit of a cynic, do they just do 1 quality copy to make their name and the rest all money makers but basically poor machines?
Sorry peeps you are getting the drunk questions I would normally ask in the pub.
I do think the answeres will be more reliable though.
Is there a purely social part of this forum?

would say they'll all be the same quality, badge engineering has been going on for years in welders. i have an old 'euromig 200' that looks suspiciously like a jasic uni mig in a different case.

 

[Tray]

Agree.
Wrote another long post with my honest/long explanations, deleted it, too long wrong forum.
Rebadged alternatives are the only way quality manufactures can compete with cheap knock offs without retooling or lowering their standards.
With some investigating you can find the rebadged version at a fraction of the cost normally at the expense of the warranty and c/s.example:
Jasic/Sherman TIG comparison/tear down from this site.
Too much vodka not enough sleep right now.
Goodnight all and thanks for the exceptionally good comments from all.

 

[eddie49]

I read the Jasic/Sherman thread with interest, anyone tried any Andeli machines?
Yeah I read Sherman TIG is supposedly a Polish knock off/differently badged Jasic at a 1/3 of the price possibly without the C/S but what about their other machines.
A bit of a cynic, do they just do 1 quality copy to make their name and the rest all money makers but basically poor machines?
Is there a purely social part of this forum?

Yes, try The Brew Room, The Social Club, The Welders Arms.
The Andeli name is new to me. The company website looks good and quite genuine. The problem would be to find a decent UK or EU retailer with warranty, mailback/repair facilities.
The Sherman is not a Polish knockoff of a Jasic, it is the same machine from the same manufacturer. Somewhere in China there is a gigafactory which makes all the inverter welders that there ever were in the whole world. Various sales and marketing companies show up and contract to buy in, paint, badge, resell and maybe even support the same basic product. I think it is a bit similar to the car market - a Lexus is a Toyota, an Infiniti is a Nissan, a Jag X type is a Mondeo, a Cadillac is a Chevy. The welder resellers have various angles to their business model. With Sherman it is a wide range and very low price, with Stahlwerk it is their 7-year warranty, with Jasic it is their big-company reputation.

 

[Sean]

" somewhere in China there's a giga factory.... "

Quite often its not usually they are just " Mom and Pop shops" small workshops where the components are brought in , assembled and sent out. Guy Martin when he went to get a bike was amazed at how low tech and labour intensive it all is is. He was expecting to see some vast industrial complex but it was just small workshops.
Would certainly explain the variability and quality controll of the grey imports

 

[Tray]

Sorry didn’t mean to come across that I thought the Sherman was a knock off.
Just meant it was the same machine rebadged at a fraction of the cost possibly at the expense of warranty and support.

 

[skotl]

Bugger!
Big fingers little touchscreen.
Question is PWM mod (want to do things the hard way over getting a machine that just works with less input from perverted me, for now!). I like a steep learning curve.
Pulse Width Modulation for speed control, is it better than analogue to control my wire feed considering I can get my hands on 230 A/C-24 DC linear variable for cheap/free.
I know my adjustments won’t be linear due to torque motor efficiency etc...
No lose situation atm with trying stuff to see if it works.
Like I said the learn the hard way(perverted as others have said)is my thing.
By the way Red Stripe and Double Vodka n Red Bulls are in full flow atm

Don't be completely put off - BChild was clearly abused by his SIP and is still recovering ( ) but I still stand by my earlier post that, if you can get one for cheap (a few tenners, not a few hundred) and spend £50 on it then you can make it infinitely better.

But I wouldn't be bothering with PWM - that's definitely overkill. A separate (laptop-type) PSU, which you would still need for PWM, and a relay running off the trigger circuit will make a ton of difference.

That said, it does depend on how much of an easy life you want - if you've got a couple of hundred quid then just buy a non-SIP. There were a couple put on sale here in the last couple of days, including a nice Clarke (not sure whether they are still available).

Oh and finally - stop apologising! You've only got 9 posts so far and most of them begin with a version of "sorry" we were all new at one time and some of us, especially me, have long since stopped apologising for our lack of knowledge

 

[BChild]

Man I should be a paramedic, talk about bringing things back to life.....

Some things deserve to die - Cosmo/SIP is top of my list

Life is too short to waste time resusitating something that is quite clearly dead

I had to rescue a hedgehog yesterday

We have three that come thro our garden every night - clay, bake and oven (how sad is it that we name them?)

The little one we rescued appears to have had an argument with a strimmer was a bit of a mess

If he survives at the hedgehog hospital I get to have him back

If he doesn't I'll be sad

I feel nothing towards my SIP but I like hedgehogs

 

[a111r]

95% of all my MIG welding experience was on a 'body off' car restoration .... using a nearly new Migmate 105, back in 1995.
I took it for granted that all hobby machines need constant tweaking. Equating to more than the welding time.

Last year, a friend swapped me the same old SIP model for something I didn't need.
I had the laptop power supply, trigger relay, parts etc. in stock, made up the feed bracket, so it was a low cost venture with a learning opportunity (which is nice).
In summary,
Old Clarkes are just much better. The paint falls off sometimes.

 

[BChild]

Last year, a friend swapped me the same old SIP model for something I didn't need.
I had the laptop power supply, trigger relay, parts etc. in stock, made up the feed bracket, so it was a low cost venture with a learning opportunity (which is nice).
In summary,

Old Clarkes are just much better. The paint falls off sometimes.

Ahhhhh absolutely true

As I said previously - once I sorted out the issues with the clarke I had to use the other week it worked really well and was utterly mod free

 

[Tray]

Hi guys

Just thought I’d let you know I carried out some of the mods in my old COSMO. This thread has been a huge help.
Thank you all.

Mods:
1. Dedicated 20V DC power supply found in back of cupboard from old laptop.
This made a huge difference on its own so I decided to go a little further.

2. Removed existing control board and replaced with cheap Pulse Width modulator with an easy to read display.

3. Put in a 20V DC relay to switch the output of the PWM to the wire feed motor and the 230V A/C input to the transformer power selection switches simultaneously.
Used the normally closed side of the relay contacts going to the motor to short the motor when not powered to stop run on.

4. Added a dedicated switch line via the thermal cut out in the main transformer to switch the relay. This had to be done in my setup as the original control board puts an A/C voltage up the umbilical cord which returns on the main wire to the gun then was filtered to control the run/stop on the existing control board.
(Not sure if it helps not having any A/C travelling along the same wire as DC in the umbilical but i didn’t like the idea of it and I didn’t have a low voltage A\C power source in my set up anyway)

As mentioned before my Dad and Brother have been welders for over 20 years. They had a quick go and said they didn’t think there was anything wrong with it now apart from it tripping the garage breaker when used on its highest setting due to only having a bit of 4mm box section to test it on.

So...Not looking for a critique of my welds but here are the 2 beads I ran with my first go ever on a machine that worked.(One setting below max)
It was quite late I didn’t have time to play any more but I feel I’m in with a chance of learning how to weld with this machine now.

.

 

[Tray]

Not sure why the pics uploaded too many times

 

[wacky7791]

wow thats a better run than I got out of mine mate, with all mods done inc new PWM board. well done that man!

 

[BChild]

1. Removed existing control board and replaced with cheap Pulse Width modulator with an easy to read display.

View attachment 240306

Oh I like the display - how coarse do you find the adjustment on the wire feed pot - this was what I struggled with in the early days as a small adjustment made a huge swing in terms of wire speed - not a problem welding thicker stuff but a complete pain when down at the bottom end welding up bacofoil panels on a mini