Lincoln L-56 vs. Inweld and others

[chadwickz71]

This is probably the 4th time already my lws Airgas has tried to convert me from running Lincoln L-56 .035 wire. Im doing just regular fab work, nothing fancy and just like to have good wire, machines etc. to help me put out good products.

They told me they'd give me a spool of Inweld to try and quoted me $107 for the L-56 vs. $53 for the Inweld same wire etc. Roughly half price, and they say most everyone uses it and its made in the usa etc and its a great wire.

Im not against switching and saving some cash just thought I'd get some opinions on what you guys think about the Inweld wire. I don't have time to bs around with cheap crap thats why i went with the L-56 to begin with.

Any thoughts on Inweld vs lincoln or other brands to think about.

[weldinglifer]

I would seek out another welding supplier. I have had good experience with Inweld products, but $103.00 for L-56 is just taking advantage. The problem is not with Inweld or Lincoln. The problem is with your local distributor.

[chadwickz71]

Well they act like im getting a big discount on it actually... Not to change the topic but what are you guys paying?

[Sandy]

You can always go to the AirGas online site and price shop for filler metals there. That'll tell you how the local guys are pricing compared to Airgas itself. Sometimes you have to choose "minimum quantity" to get a price quote but at least it's a way of getting guestimates of prices before I go charging off to town with 50 cents in my pocket and getting hit with sticker shock.

http://www.airgas.com/browse/categor...175&WT.svl=175

[DesertRider33]

How big are these spools? That's a lot of money for a roll of wire, unless you're buying 50-lb or bigger coils.

I've found that in the solid wires, it doesn't matter the brand, they weld and feed pretty much the same, within the same classification (ER70S-6). The fluxcore wires, now there is where the big differences are between crappy wire and good wire. Same with stick electrodes. Anything with a flux has a great potential to be good or bad.

It's not easy to mess up just a plain old solid mig or tig wire. Something would have to be very wrong with the metal composition (in which case it wouldn't meet the classification standard), or the copper coating, or in the drawing (manufacture) of the wire (varying diameter) to ruin it. Not likely any of that is happening very often, even with the off brands. I use off brands of mig and tig wire and have no problem with them.

[Scott Young]

I personally like hobart's hb-28, but i have used a bunch of inweld's wire in .035. it isn't bad wire. each wire has it's own peculiar operating characteristics.

[Supe]

Two real differences between the wires. The Lincoln wire uses a different lube with different arc stabilizers, and they guarantee a controlled manganese content of less than 1.6% which means that it meets A1 designation, which really isn't important unless you're welding on vessels or using procedures with impact requirements.

In my opinion, you won't see a difference.

[chadwickz71]

Thats some good info everyone.

And yes im buying 44lb spools. My welding shop is Airgas, they stock Kolbelco, Radnor, and Inweld all the time so i wouldn't have to worry about constantly ordering in the Lincoln.

They have been trying to convert me off the Lincoln for a while now, they must not make much money off of it. There proposition was they would give me a spool of Radnor and Inweld and let me try them both against the lincoln and see what i want to do. Free of charge...

I figure i'll take them up on that offer when my rolls start to get low.

[DesertRider33]

I don't notice any difference between Radnor and Lincoln solid mig wires.

However, I won't touch Radnor fluxcore wire with a 10 foot pole, you can have that junk. I threw it out of my machine on one job it ran so terrible. Same with the Radnor stick electrodes. I prefer Hobart and Lincoln fluxcore wires and sticks.

[TozziWelding]

I run the cheap store brand wire for my solid wire work, usually .045 with CO2 for repair work, and the down and dirty stuff like dump truck beds, and snow plow repair. The stuff I use it on isn't picky. As far as my dual shield goes, I like Hobart Excel Arc 71, or McKay 777 only.