yes welders are on hand however I use mine at least twice a week, Sure I have thought about its uses in SHTF but its not really the reason why I have them, you can weld with two car batteries, leads and a coat hangger if needed but not sure if I would trust that I am getting good penatration with the welds.
yes welders are on hand however I use mine at least twice a week, Sure I have thought about its uses in SHTF but its not really the reason why I have them, you can weld with two car batteries, leads and a coat hangger if needed but not sure if I would trust that I am getting good penatration with the welds.This method (battery's) is good for tacking or very light gauge material. With no shield on the arc it would be better to braze. A decent 115V wire feed with flux core wire would be the way to go. It does not draw high amps so an average genny would support it. You could run it off of a battery bank with a 50 A inducer.
Ive used 110v mig welders run off of generators. They did not perform well. I have also heard many stories about the control panels on the welders frying out while on a generator. If your going to run off a generator your much safer with a stick welder. If you don't want something big like a Miller Bobcat, both Honda and Hobart sell generators with built in stick welders. They are quite pricy, but it might be something to look for on craigslist or ebay.
Exactly!The trick is to spool up the genny with a load before you squeeze the trigger on the welder. Another thing to remember about a 115V unit is the short duty cycle. You can not just lay into the work and run a continuous bead. I have used these small units to do 1/4 inch metal fab on remote site's with a genny and had no issues. We used a drill to put a load on the genny and then ran the welder. May be doing that again soon.