Marquette - 175A M12208 - Looking for advice for first machine

admin

Hi everyone, new here and to welding in general. Always wanted to take the plunge and start welding (only experience so far has been a small oxy-acetylene kit, and some years back when I messed around with my uncle's stick welder.) Been reading various threads about try this and that, but when I was looking at local facebook classifieds, someone is selling a Marquette model M12208 175amp MIG welder for ~$400. What he's told me so far is that he bought it from centurytool.net probably 20 years ago, and that he's only run it with gas, never as flux core. I was wondering, does anyone have an opinion or any relevant knowledge of the Marquette brand? The seller said that it is basically rebadged Lincoln internals and that parts are still available, but I really can't find much else on the web about this model. Since I would really be expecting a low-use but potentially leaving some room to grown, would this be better for me than say a Lincoln 140, or Eastwood 180 (which is only $500 new, yeah Chinese etc. but still, $100 for a little piece of mind?)