Kevin is looking over the bright yellow AHP AlphaMIG 250 combination MIG welder / arc welder (stick welder). Yes, the same guys who brought us the AlphaTIG 200X are now bringing out this new MIG welder. It’s a dual voltage machine – it’ll run on 110 or 220 volts – with 250 amp output and voltage that runs from 15 volts on the low side to 30 volts on the high side.

Inside the welder, you can see it will handle 33-pound spools of welding wire. It also has dual drive rollers, and the entire mechanism is metal – there’s no plastic. There’s also a quick feed switch that lets you advance the welding wire when you’re changing it. You just push the button, and it quick feeds the wire to the end of the gun rather than requiring you to hold the trigger and run all the electronics to advance the welding wire. The manufacturers tuck the switch away because you don’t need it every day.

The circuit-breaker style on / off switch is on the back of the machine. On the front control panel, there’s a 2T / 4T selector; a MIG gun / stick selector; Dig control; Voltage control; Arc current or wire feed, depending upon which function you’re in; a couple of nice displays; and a MIG gun or spool gun selector. “It’s pretty simple,” Kevin says.

One nice aspect of this welder is that it’s spool gun capable. So if you put a spool gun on it and change your gas from CO2 with argon to straight argon, you can weld aluminum.

Now it’s time to make some sparks! Kevin has set up a couple of 1″ x 1/2″ pieces of steel about 1/16″ apart. He sets the welder at 30 volts and about 600 inches of wire feed a minute. He runs a bead.

“I’ve never welded that hot before!” Kevin says. He shows the weld, which he could see digging into the metal as he was welding. If you look at the end of the welded metal, you can see it took a pretty good chunk out of the steel as he was coming off the end, so there’s plenty of welding power. Caron was getting a good 1/4″ of penetration – not bad for the first weld.

That gives you a quick look at this new welder. If you’re interested, get Kevin your contact information and, when the ship comes in, he’ll notify you. The price will be just under $1,000, shipped, for a dual voltage 250 MIG that’s spool gun ready.

Kevin is going back to work, so you have time to subscribe to see more how-to videos and come out to his Web site to see his wild sculptures and sign up for his newsletter.

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