SIP mig welder wire feed upgrade PWM controler. Improve wire feed solve problemsSIP mig welder wire

[norm74]

HI my name is rob and i have an SIP 150 MIG welder, i seen this on ebay http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/31086498...AX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649#ht_1184wt_999, the question is has anyone on here used this and has it work and solved the problems or do i do the other power conversion that i see people doing, im going to upgrade to the euro torch and a new wire feed motor so i can run a longer lead.

thankyou for your help.

 

[Sean]

if it provides a stable voltage to the wire feed then its not unreasonable. I did the separate transformer mod which was quick and easy. His advice for the rest of it made me switch off " water or sugar" (Guess hes been looking at Malcolms tutorial as bags of sugar dont often make it in to the workshop, tea cupboard excepted).

Steel liner, brace the feed roller and stabilize the motor feed and off you go.

 

[cracker666]

As Sean I did the transformer mod, brace the rollers, metal liner, trimmer mod on pc board.

 

[GuyP]

Had the Migmate 150 for a few years but only recently started to try and use it seriously. Bad welds everywhere.
Did the usual searches and found all the fixes needed.
The added feed wheel brace made the wire feed reliably with minimum tension.
Made a new regulated supply to provide 24v unregulated and also regulated adjustable 2V to 20V for the feed motor, added the relay for the feed motor to short it out when weld stopped. Butchered the control board so the 2K pot now directly alters the regulated supply voltage and feeds through the butchered board to the motor. Removed the transistor and heatsink off the control board as no longer in the circuit.
That made wire feed nice and reliable, now I can learn to weld.
The nutty triple switch arrangement was a bit crazy so I ripped that out and now use a 6 position rotary switch that (with an array of diodes) uses the new unregulated 24volt supply to switch 3 large relays to replace the switches. The simple rotary switch now makes much more sense.
Next move is to use the vacant half of the rotary switch to adjust the regulated supply voltage for each power position so I don't have to keep altering the feed knob.
Work cable and weld cable get a bit warm, maybe get some fatter wire there?

Question is, did anyone ever manage to weld with this thing out of the box?

Regards...... Guy

 

[FranV8]

I did with a Migmate 100 (same guts just lower go?) , but it was on 1.6mm steel (or less, I was restoring a VW chassis under a kit car) Needed the torch hose really straight, and a month with an 'x' in it. It was a touch variable, like me playing golf or bowling, no rhyme or reason to a good outcome or a frustrating bad one.

Still got it, plan to do the mods and get it up and used again at some point. Even considering a little Arduino to control it....