Review on Advanced ARCRAFT Inverter Welder for Automatic Welding by Bobby Martinez

This thing is amazing. I have a small gas welder that I use, but where I live the wind is too strong to use it outdoors. I bet on this little cored wire welder and it was great. I can't believe how easy it is. I put in a spool of .030 FCAW wire from a local store and welded it in 5 minutes. Cored wire has a lot more penetration than I'm used to from gas welding and as this is a new machine I increased the current too much causing the weld to burn through a bit. It is strong and with a little practice it will be the perfect pairing. I'd rather have too much power than too little. If you look at the photo of the back of my first weld you can see I have good penetration and little/no inclusions which is great for a first weld with a new box. I made the purchase specifically for a small project with my 12 year old son. He wanted to try his hand at welding and was able to burn through the joint after about 5 minutes of practice. I couldn't resist not posting a photo of where he's welding. And no, I wouldn't let it cook again without extra protection. The welder is really well done. The cables are of good quality and a good length. Some of these cheaper welders have cords so short you can't move around while you work. That's a good length. I'm used to the gas canister around the torch, which this one doesn't have, but when you think about it, it's not really needed unless you have shielding gas ;) The pointed nozzle really lets you immerse yourself in the corer. The other important thing is that since this unit uses electronics and no transformer, it weighs about 10% of what my Gas MIG weighs. I can easily carry the thing through the garden and don't get tired. I think the lack of a transformer also allows for stepless current control. There is also infinite variability in wire speed. The other welder I had only had 4 taps, which isn't too bad, but I think I could really go for that. I really can't believe this is good value for the money. Good job Archcraft.