Teardown video of a Chinese TIG machine

[C. Livingstone]

Hey, Mark,

Thanks for giving the Everlast rationale for that 210EXT design shift. I kind of wondered about it, but liked the new tack somehow anyway, and now also the reasoning behind it seems to me good too.

Rock On, Everlast!

Impressive is as impressive does. The full surface mount technology experienced a lot more issues. It is not readily repairable at a local level when it came to long term sustainability. It uses, in many cases proprietary components which require replacing the whole board instead of replacing the part or parts that have given trouble (not speaking of our issues with it specifically here, but in general regarding customers desires to repair and sustain their inverter units beyond the warranty period. One thing Zizzle doesn't understand is that you use what works best. Size and compactness are not the main goals. There are tradeoffs in both type systems...IF everyone is building with surface mount tech, they are doing so because of cost reductions and not necessarily because it makes sense to long term sustainability of parts and service at an economical price point for the customer.

[shovelon]

No,

Not at all.

You brought the HTP feature of "amplitude control" up as a superior one, but seem to be unable to articulate how that is.

So, I'll just drop this simple request, as I don't want to tax the neurons or synaptic membranes of HTP users any further.

Ha, ha, ha...

Don't own an HTP so my neurons and synaptic membranes are fully intact.

AC balance is the duration of each polarity(EN and EP) depending on which one the manufacturer displays.
Amplitude is the intensity of each polarity. Miller displays the average between the two.
Frequency or Hrtz is the speed at which the polarities switch back and forth.

[dbstoo]

Surely surface mount components have less chance of dislodging with the usual knock around machine movement in a working environment, than do those ridiculous daisy chained components soldered together floating an inch above a board while holding their weight only by their soldered legs, or even those unsupported small boards just being held by soldered wires, instead of a mechanical connection.

You would think that surface mount had less chance of dislodging, but overheated surface mount components shift easily since there is NO mechanical means of holding the components in place. A discreet component will be supported by the wire that sticks through the board. The vibration problem comes when the component is far enough off the board for heavy vibrations to cause the leads to break. Coatings can keep that from being a problem.

The first picture with the freestanding transistor looks like it was a field repair. If you look at the board, there are several spots where the soldering is quite different from the original factory work (V38, for instance)

Like Southpaw noted, there are advantages to surface mount, and to multiplane circuit boards, but most of those advantages are in the manufacturing, not necessarily the performance nor reliability.

Dan

[C. Livingstone]

Hey,

Thanks for the added info on amplitude control, as the way HTP and Miller implement its adjustment might be different.

I mean, I know how AC balance adjustment is the time spent, in percentage, on each polarity, and how amplitude control is the adjustment of amperage on each polarity.

But, I've wondered how it is that used. Like if there is the ability to only reduce, in percentage, the amperage on one side, i.e., wouldn't it be stupid to reduce both by the same percentage, as it would neutralize any real change except to lower potential amperage. Although, maybe reducing both, by different percentages might not be too convoluted a setting...

And also, I'm guessing that there is one side that would tend to be the one that gets adjusted more, in order to get the obvious benefit, whatever that is. And I'm also guessing that since the AC balance get a lessor percentage, time wise, that it's the DC amplitude adjustment that gets most of the the attention or reduction, in order to have better heat control and the ability to use smaller electrodes for higher amperage somehow.

But these are just my guesses, as I'm happy enough with two of the wave forms that my machine makes available. And at this stage in my life I'll undoubtedly never get into high-industrial TIG welding, but am still curious about welding technology and how it impacts praxeological preferences or choices.

My machine also has an Advanced Pulse function for AC only, that I haven't really explored much, except to try it, but wondered if it might have implemented some non-adjustable amplitude control into it somehow.

Don't own an HTP so my neurons and synaptic membranes are fully intact.

AC balance is the duration of each polarity(EN and EP) depending on which one the manufacturer displays.
Amplitude is the intensity of each polarity. Miller displays the average between the two.
Frequency or Hrtz is the speed at which the polarities switch back and forth.

[C. Livingstone]

Otherwise, maybe we can get Oscar back in the discussion, as he's an amplitude control HTP user. I mean, I know he's anti-Everlast, but that doesn't mean we can't be cyber friends and exchange a few implied insults, through references to neurons, synaptic membranes, or neocortices. Ha, ha, ha...

[shovelon]

Hey,

Thanks for the added info on amplitude control, as the way HTP and Miller implement its adjustment might be different.

I mean, I know how AC balance adjustment is the time spent, in percentage, on each polarity, and how amplitude control is the adjustment of amperage on each polarity.

But, I've wondered how it is that used. Like if there is the ability to only reduce, in percentage, the amperage on one side, i.e., wouldn't it be stupid to reduce both by the same percentage, as it would neutralize any real change except to lower potential amperage. Although, maybe reducing both, by different percentages might not be too convoluted a setting...

And also, I'm guessing that there is one side that would tend to be the one that gets adjusted more, in order to get the obvious benefit, whatever that is. And I'm also guessing that since the AC balance get a lessor percentage, time wise, that it's the DC amplitude adjustment that gets most of the the attention or reduction, in order to have better heat control and the ability to use smaller electrodes for higher amperage somehow.

But these are just my guesses, as I'm happy enough with two of the wave forms that my machine makes available. And at this stage in my life I'll undoubtedly never get into high-industrial TIG welding, but am still curious about welding technology and how it impacts praxeological preferences or choices.

My machine also has an Advanced Pulse function for AC only, that I haven't really explored much, except to try it, but wondered if it might have implemented some non-adjustable amplitude control into it somehow.

I am sure amplitude adjustment on the Miller and HTP are the same and provide the same results.

Yes there is one side of amplitude adjustment that I use more and it is the EP side. If I go lower than EN you can reduce tungsten balling and spitting. If I go higher I can get a more intense arc for cleaning, but at the expense of the tungsten balling or spitting more. But I can shorten the duration of the EP side by increasing balance on the EN side to sequester the time the tungsten would have to overheat.

For instance I have a new thick alum/small tacking program thanks to Zank's trials. It is long 99% straight polarity balance, with a short EP balance duration at an arc intensity double of EN. This lifts the oxides just enough to clear the surface to add 5356 filler, with or without helium. I do add helium but only 25% to speed the process. Any other time I would want to go DC straight with pure helium, and that would only let me use 4000 series filler.

I tried the AC-Pulse feature on a certain Chinese machine. It is a switching mode between DC straight and whatever AC settings you have. It sets the duration of DC straight polarity, and then goes into AC for the rest of the cycle. The cycle frequency can be set but as I recall maximum was 20 times per second. The DC side was very dirty, did not want to get base metal fusion unless pure helium was used, but did clean up on the AC side. From what I recall the manufacturer prohibits the use of more than 25% helium, so that is a problem. But it did do some to make up for lack of amplitude adjustment. And any more than 50% dc would prohibit the use of 5000 series filler for good root fusion.

Odd thing was about the waveforms is the Advanced squarewave is nothing more than conventional squarewave, which works good. The Soft-Squarewave and the Tri-Wave were wacky as they somehow hobbled the arc output by almost half. Don't know if they just chopped off part of the arc in order to hobble it but DJ found it useless.

[soutthpaw]

I am sure amplitude adjustment on the Miller and HTP are the same and provide the same results.

Yes there is one side of amplitude adjustment that I use more and it is the EP side. If I go lower than EN you can reduce tungsten balling and spitting. If I go higher I can get a more intense arc for cleaning, but at the expense of the tungsten balling or spitting more. But I can shorten the duration of the EP side by increasing balance on the EN side to sequester the time the tungsten would have to overheat.

For instance I have a new thick alum/small tacking program thanks to Zank's trials. It is long 99% straight polarity balance, with a short EP balance duration at an arc intensity double of EN. This lifts the oxides just enough to clear the surface to add 5356 filler, with or without helium. I do add helium but only 25% to speed the process. Any other time I would want to go DC straight with pure helium, and that would only let me use 4000 series filler.

I tried the AC-Pulse feature on a certain Chinese machine. It is a switching mode between DC straight and whatever AC settings you have. It sets the duration of DC straight polarity, and then goes into AC for the rest of the cycle. The cycle frequency can be set but as I recall maximum was 20 times per second. The DC side was very dirty, did not want to get base metal fusion unless pure helium was used, but did clean up on the AC side. From what I recall the manufacturer prohibits the use of more than 25% helium, so that is a problem. But it did do some to make up for lack of amplitude adjustment. And any more than 50% dc would prohibit the use of 5000 series filler for good root fusion.

Odd thing was about the waveforms is the Advanced squarewave is nothing more than conventional squarewave, which works good. The Soft-Squarewave and the Tri-Wave were wacky as they somehow hobbled the arc output by almost half. Don't know if they just chopped off part of the arc in order to hobble it but DJ found it useless.

Yeah, I'm waiting to hear back from Oleg on the issue, but that is a perfect example of why I test every machine before I sell/ship it.
I'm going to start a separate thread on "Independent Amplitude and other advanced waveform controls" I think it will net a lot of useful info. I'll try and explain the Everlast " Advanced AC pulse" better in it.
I am sure Kemppi and Fronius etc have their own advanced waveforms so maybe we have members that have experience with those?

[zank]

Excellent idea!

[C. Livingstone]

Wow, thanks for that. Yeah, I meant EN, not DC. And I'm a little surprising that EP tends to get more adjustment. Very interesting.

Yeah, when I've used the Triangular wave form, I do seem to have to increase the amperage significantly, if I recall. But, since I use it for thin aluminum, at least so far in practice, I doubt it will ever be a limiting factor due to the nature of its use, at least for me.

"Yes there is one side of amplitude adjustment that I use more and it is the EP side. If I go lower than EN you can reduce tungsten balling and spitting. If I go higher I can get a more intense arc for cleaning, but at the expense of the tungsten balling or spitting more. But I can shorten the duration of the EP side by increasing balance on the EN side to sequester the time the tungsten would have to overheat."

[soutthpaw]

Here is the new waveform thread http://weldingweb.com/vbb/showthread.php?t=574241

[hog guts]

I own an htp and I'd buy another one. I like it a lot. Not saying any other brand is bad just saying I like my htp it gets used about 5 days a week for mostly aluminum 1/8 to 1/4 thick.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[shovelon]

I own an htp and I'd buy another one. I like it a lot. Not saying any other brand is bad just saying I like my htp it gets used about 5 days a week for mostly aluminum 1/8 to 1/4 thick.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

No doubt. That is why they are in short supply. Reliability and build quality seems to be very good.

[Oscar]

From the documentation I've read and the threads BC has posted, the Dynasty's have additional ways of displaying the changes in amplitude over the HPT 221 interface, but like shovelon said, the essesnce is the same, one polarity gets a higher amperage peak than the other. The rest is mathematical semantics with a little arithmetic thrown in.

[ronaldinho_07]

jasic wsme 315 i have found these pics on seller's site
what do you guys think about it
its about 700$ without shipping

[That Guy There]

^^^ well if you looking for a $700 door stop by all means purchase it

[soutthpaw]

Do you read Chinese? So you know what the knob labels mean.

Sent from mobile. Not responsible for Typos

[mechanic416]

Its also 3 phase 380 volts. Not made for the USA

[C. Livingstone]

Yeah,

It looks quite good, probably even from a Zizzle perspective, I'm guessing. And if it's a 300+ amp model, it seems like a brilliant value, especially for those on the Australian continent, where these units are undoubtedly more pervasive. But, yeah, 3 phase may be a problem for many home/shop users.

That Chinese Jasic brand seems like a good one. I believe it's the same factory that CK Worldwide and Mr. TIG are using for the new MT-200 AC/DC unit.

Similar units are branded as Razorweld (at least in a 200 amp version) here on the North American continent, and can be had with a digital touchpad front panel, or like the one pictured below, for a little cheaper with an analog/knobs front panel. But I'm guessing that both are digitally controlled. I doubt that many have been bought here yet, though, as service and support may be in an early stage.

Honestly though, the AHP 200X represents a proven, full-featured, 200 amp AC/DC that has no competition in its class, at around $750, delivered, with no extortion paid to the State cult, in most cases.

http://beavertools.com/kjr200aac-dc-...r-package.html

jasic wsme 315 i have found these pics on seller's site
what do you guys think about it
its about 700$ without shipping

[Zizzle]

The WSME-315 looks like a very old rehashed design. Tell tale is how many active devices they have. More modern devices have better much ratings - to the point where you only need 2 IGBTs to do the output waveform generation, and 4 to do the main inverter H-bridge.

Also not they aren't using all copper bus bars. The HF output transformers looks to be aluminium and there is a vertical bus bar that looks to be chromed!? May be it's just shiny aluminium.

Same junky small white connectors and unsupported daughter boards as most Chinese designed/built welders we've seen here.

Design looks similar to this machine:

[C. Livingstone]

Cool,

Good to know that on units like those it's easy to spot and replace popped caps. Even my solder technique could do that, but certainly not on one of the SMB-style units.

[lugweld]

WSME is simply a Chinese designation for AC/DC with plasma. Sort of like AC/DC/P. Jasic has been around a while and is known as a decent and technically capable manufacturer in China. Brand awareness comes more from the company, not the individual name. It's not the top name but is well known internationally. But as far as the daughter boards things go, again, the Miller up until this year's 210 from the pictures posted sported those, and you'll find aluminum there too in areas.

[C. Livingstone]

Wow,

That's a plasma unit too. I wondered why it had the two gas/air outlets and inputs. My combo unit doesn't do it that way. And it looks like the pedal has that two cable arrangement, which seems a little antiquated.

WSME is simply a Chinese designation for AC/DC with plasma. Sort of like AC/DC/P. Jasic has been around a while and is known as a decent and technically capable manufacturer in China. Brand awareness comes more from the company, not the individual name. It's not the top name but is well known internationally. But as far as the daughter boards things go, again, the Miller up until this year's 210 from the pictures posted sported those, and you'll find aluminum there too in areas.

[ronaldinho_07]

finally i go with Jasic TIG 200P AC/DC,not the best but it costs only 550$ from a local shop
with pulse feature,it works great for my titanium welding

[C. Livingstone]

Yeah,

What a brilliant value.

Ten years ago, at least here on the North American continent, a full-featured 200 amp AC/DC like that was probably ten times that price, yet be less efficient and almost impossible to move without a fork lift. And, thankfully the Chinese producers don't rely on much on the statist invention of Intellectual Property and Patenting, which creates little monopolies and higher prices.

And, without State expansion (debasing) of a fiat currency, Deflation is the norm, not Inflation.

Sure, initially the price on a new technology starts high, but then comes down with more units sold and more efficient manufacturing techniques. Like with computers, hard drives, RAM memory, smartphones, big screen TVs, etc.

But, yeah, that's the Market at work, giving consumers what they want, without holding taxpayers hostage to do so, i.e., producers risk their own capital, and if they do well they profit, if they don't they fail, unless the State bails them out for being "Too Big and Connected To Be Allowed To Fail", which is a unAmerican ploy that privatizes Big Industry profits and socializes or collectivizes corporate losses.

[flightrisk]

Here's my experience and to start with I've never had the need to open the cases so I'm basing it on performance not build.
I'll premise this by stating I'm in Australia and thus our geographical location and dollar v $US sometimes make life difficult for us.
I run a small fabrication business (35 people) specialising in stainless steel ranging from 1.6mm to 10mm. Very occasionally we work with mild steel and aluminium.
The TIG machines we have running at the moment (pretty much all day everyday) are:
Old 150amp CIG (Aussie made) transformer AC/DC machines X 2
Jasic Razorweld 200ac/dc machines x 2
Miller Dynasty 350 x 1
Kemppi MasterTIG x 1

Now, talking to my guys who are wayyyy more practiced than me, in DC, none of them can really tell the difference and all produce nice welds. AC is a different story. We have cooked the Jasics 4 times when doing aluminium work. They just stop working but, they get replaced under warranty free of charge. And they cost $1200 v $9000 for the Kemppi.
It is a false economy as you spend time without a machine, transporting it back, spending time setting up the new one etc etc.
Thus, the next one will be another Miller, Kemppi or maybe a Fronios.

At home I have an Everlast 210Ext and I like it. I mainly use it for aluminium work and it works well and has plenty of grunt! Price wise in Australia I paid $2300.
This puts it between the Jasic and the 200amp Dynasty. Everlast are new to Australia and haven't a great deal of equivalent competition. I see no point in a big $ machine for home when I own a few 10mins away at the factory.
We tried the 2 Jasic machines as an economic experiment. Regardless of their faults they paid for themselves in a week so we aren't behind for the exercise.

For ease of setup I rank them:

1: Miller
2: Everlast
=3: Kemppi and Jasic
4: old tranformer machines unless it's purely DC which it goes to the top cause you just have to turn it on!

I have come to the conclusion many moons ago that yes, you get what you pay for but, ultimately you should be spending a relevant amount of money to the return you expect from your investment as well as what you can actually afford.
P.s.
As for MIGs at work. We have Fronios and Miller pulse machines. No Chinese stuff there!