Buying first Arc welder

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Here's my second question.  I paid $400 a while back to have some doors made for my bodega and realised that for the money I spent I could have done a much better job with my highschool shops welding skills and bought my own welder.  Finding a "craftsman" here is hard and no one will take the time to do something properly like doing it yourself.  I have been looking around at welders and think I have it narrowed to a Lincoln AC180 or  AC225. I will be welding gates (1/2"-3/4" bar) and fabrications out of 1/4" plate or less.  Is the AC 180 sufficent?   Other names available here are NEO, INFRA, and SOL CAR. A Lincoln AC225 will cost me $400 here.
Reply:If I understand your project correctly, I would think the 180 could do the job.  I used to have the AC225 and it never had a problem with any mild steel project I had.  You don't need full penetration for a gate.  These lincoln ac machines do just fine on stuff 1/2" down to about 1/8" in a single pass.  Thicker stuff might require multi-pass, but that's generally not a big problem.What is a bodega?I just looked up bodega and found out that it's a grocery store...Initially, I thought it was a house, trailer, truck or something like that...it WOULD make a good name for a truck...the Chevy Bodega.Last edited by smithboy; 11-16-2006 at 10:10 AM.Smithboy...if it ain't broke, you ain't tryin'.
Reply:"The new 2007 Chevy Bodega...Andale, andale! Arriba, arriba!" catchy huh? They'll sell like hotcakes...or hot tamales...whatever.If you don't have the time to do it right, then you definitely don't have the time to do it over.
Reply:Thanks.  Here a bodega is a workshop/storage.