I am currently building windmill towers with spiral welds all testing has been on 1/4" thick plate and with MIG PULSE .052 wire but now I am upping the wall thickness and switching to SUBMERGED ARCH process now I am seeking the cheapest route for the purchase of this machine and was wondering if subarch has a special power source needed and can a regular miller and/or Lincoln mig welder work? Also does subarch require 480 run to it?
Reply:It's Submerged Arc not Submerged Arch. You need a CV power source with a good duty cycle. I don't think there is such a thing as cheap when setting up to run sub-arc. Sub-arc would be 3 phase power for sure and probably run on 480 volts. Then you need a special wire feeder for sub-arc with a flux hopper. Lincoln is king when it comes to sub-arc. A DC600 is a popular machine for sub-arc but I've seen one blow up! I was actually walking by it to go to the rod oven about 15' away and saw sparks coming out of it. I was about to go shut it off, when BANG! It sounded like dynamite going off. Blew the main circuit breaker in the shop around 11:30 PM and it was pitch black. Called the maintenance guy and had power back on in about 1 1/2 hours after he figured out what had happened. I'll never forget how loud that was!