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Steve C said:Actually, once you have the machine, tig is pretty cheap to operate. Tungsten electrodes are about a dollar, and they last a long time.
In body work, tig gives you the opportunity to add a minimum of heat and material so that you can hammer it flat with a hammer and dolly. This allows full length welds in panels, rather than spot welds.
It took me a few months to learn how to butt weld light gauge material, but it was kind of fun. At first it is harder than mig, but after some time you can do things the mig will never do.
I agree, however, that the mig is probly a better spot welding machine.
no sepcial helmet or suit is needed.
Anyway, watch some of the current crop of "hot rod" of chopper reality shows, etc. They use tig almost exclusively for sheet metal work and high quality fab work.
If you can only buy one machine, take some time and do some research.
All just my opinions, of coarse.
Junk said:Mig - great all around process. Once heard you could teach a monkey to mig in 5 minutes. I guess that's true, but no guarantee his welds would hold. One critical thing to keep in mind with mig is just cause the weld looks pretty don't mean it's gonna hold. Plus, for structural welds, either spray transfer or flux core is the best way to go any way. The assmonkey that build some of the s*** on my truck thought he could weld because it looked so nice. Great, except I can't trust the s*** unless I pull it apart and re-weld it.
If you go mig, do yourself a favor and go 220V. If not, you may highly regret it. The 135 machines are great for being portable and doing sheet metal, but if you want to do even .120 then get yourself at least a 175 machine. The HH180 is a nice rig. The HH is a tad easier to learn than the MM175 since the MM175 has infinite variable versus the HH having set taps.