Arc welder - aldi's

i got an arc welder from argos about 20 years ago and thought £40 was cheap back then its never let me down once even though ive resorted to useing old vise grips as an electrode holder

the sip migmate i have for the thin stuff is now 15 yrs old and since ive converted it to run off propper pub gas botttles its been great itll even do chassis work at a push

even though i was told id have more chance useing a bic lighter between the two of them there aint much i cant weld

i ws thinking of getting another little mig welder and setting it up to weld aluminium as thats where the money is with welding nowadays

redhand said:

Readthe thread title FFS It's an ARC welder Fick southern softy.. :doh: :bolt:

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excuse me. but bedford is actually north of watford.
so just another northerner really.

I would say largely you get what you pay for as far as tools are concerned. however if you factor in the Aldi/Lidl pricing policies and the fact there aren't that many companies actually making tools much of the stuff from the discount retailers is fine for home use if not pro use.
Some thing with an Aldi label on it is quite likely to have been made in the same factory as an SIP, Clarke etc. A good example is the generic 1/2 air impact wrench, Aldi £20 Clarke £30 SIP £40 all identical tools (I don't know the actual prices this is just an illustration)
I have an 18V battery drill from Aldi and its been fine, battery life's not as good as my Makita but a fraction of the cost.

well said

waldershelf said:

I would say largely you get what you pay for as far as tools are concerned. however if you factor in the Aldi/Lidl pricing policies and the fact there aren't that many companies actually making tools much of the stuff from the discount retailers is fine for home use if not pro use.
Some thing with an Aldi label on it is quite likely to have been made in the same factory as an SIP, Clarke etc. A good example is the generic 1/2 air impact wrench, Aldi £20 Clarke £30 SIP £40 all identical tools (I don't know the actual prices this is just an illustration)
I have an 18V battery drill from Aldi and its been fine, battery life's not as good as my Makita but a fraction of the cost.

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.........Agreed......Aldi / Lidl / Iceland even do the same with that poxy 3 bird roast.

ricc said:

unless its fan cooled it will struggle with 3.25 rods..thermal cut out will blow..you almost want two , weld with one whilst the other is cooling down.... probably be fine with 2.5 rods....... a fan cooled one would be fine with 3.25 almost continuous.

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Too right...ten seconds of welding, then half an hour waiting for the thermal cutout to cut back in again.
a waste of time

Forgot to mention its the turbo fan cooled model

its a 4 bird roast this year - its got goose

why pay more

Nice! You could cook it with the ARC welder

bennybenny said:

cheap tools are a false economy .... good idea till they break ok i know all singing and all dancing stuff can break but id sooner use a better quality tool in the first place .. like roll craft tools good idea and great for a diy grandad but if you make a liveing out of ya tools not a good option ....altho i will say they do some good hand lamps ...

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the price you pay for a tool is not about its how good it is they all come off the same production line you just get amazing ones and crud ones, the amazing ones are sold for alot but while you can by a crud one that can do the same job and for a 1/3 of the price, it just depends how much abuse they get, you will one day get to a point where its not about a label it is purely about the use you would get out of it like anything clothes, cars, electrical stuff (snap on and mac tools is the way forward they come to your door and the more you buy the better discounts you get )

Woodzy said:

the price you pay for a tool is not about its how good it is they all come off the same production line you just get amazing ones and crud ones, the amazing ones are sold for alot but while you can by a crud one that can do the same job and for a 1/3 of the price, it just depends how much abuse they get, you will one day get to a point where its not about a label it is purely about the use you would get out of it like anything clothes, cars, electrical stuff (snap on and mac tools is the way forward they come to your door and the more you buy the better discounts you get )

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It all depends on the type of tool to an extent. Its always worth spending money on a decent ratchet for example, or things with moving parts, if you are doing a fair amount of mechanical work, as these can fail, and skin your knuckles, just when everything else is going tits-up. But certain tools like spanners, hammers, screwdrivers etc, dont have to be snap-on to be good. Even the cheap ones are perfectly good in most cases.

I work in a place where our tools get a lot of abuse, undoing very seized and corroded parts most of the time. We often have to heat and bend spanners to get into awkward places, cut them down, weld extensions on........you cannot justify doing that to snap-on/mac, but the cheaper stuff is more than upto it.

Its worth remembering that Aldi's target market is the home hobbyist, not Jenson Button's pit-crew............and the tools they sell will serve that purpose.

Choppertrash... I see where you are coming from but not sure I agree. Even though we are only driveway spannerists... I spent a reasonable amount of money on every spanner and socket simply becasue I knew that if I didn't the socket would rip open or the spanner snap when we were trying to do something more than a little difficult. I have found that cheap tools tend to damage reluctant nuts and bolts while more expensive items will take them out easily.

Completely agree that anything with moving parts - ratchets and so on - should be bought as the best you can afford... £30 to £40 for a half inch drive ratchet seems about right to me, and I think the torque wrench was about £60. Every socket was between five and ten quid from the Halfords Professional range and the impact set was (from memory) about £60.

But they have lasted and done their work well.. never had any of them fail, and Kai does give them some serious jip when he gets into it!

I have never bought a single tool from Aldi that has lasted more than a few days... the last pneumatic snipper I bought snapped a pivot pin within ten minutes!