ForneyC5 hums, vibrates, poor arc

admin

Hi to ALLMy "new"  Forney c5    AC welder, has some  problem.  Lots of hum, and vibration. (no fan on this machine)  .It will strike an arc(on highest tap, 180)  after much scraping, but wont hold it--- just peters out.Very simple machine, it has only the transformer and taps, a rectifier for the battery charger,  and one cap.   Wondering if a bad cap could cause this.  I inspected everything carefully,  nothing gets  hot, nor are there signs of any previous heating. Core of transformer  coming loose??  Any suggestions??   thanks   AL
Reply:What type of rod are you trying to weld with? Suggest you try some 6013 or 7014 with it.
Reply:Been  using 7018 on my AC Lincoln crackerbox, so I just tried that---
Reply:I had an old Forney, for several years, I tried 7018 on it several times with very little success. The only 7018 I had much luck with on it was 7018 AC and those results were nothing to brag about. It was like there was no power there to strike an arc and if you did get it started it was subject to quit burning when it wanted to and was heck to get started again. The 6013 and 7014 worked great with it no problems with them. I think the old Forney's are pretty much bullet proof. The one I had was given to me by a family member and after he passed away, I purchased a Lincoln AC/DC machine and gave the old Forney to a son of the man that had given it to me. By the way the New Lincoln I have doesn't have any problem burning the 7018.
Reply:Very interesting-- you have exactly described how it acts with 7018----I didnt not know there was that much difference in welders!!   I did try several other rods and it worked well, I even had to turn the amps  down from what i usually use on the old  Lincoln. I am now working on my next project which is to connect a stand alone, airco wire feeder to my dc welder.   Ive been reading some welding books, and I think it should work, any experience with Airco??   Cant seem to find ANY info on the wire feeder.  Model AHF-TThanks for your help!!!  AL
Reply:Sorry, I don't have any experiance with Airco, but I am sure there are several others on this site that have. I liked the old Forney welder, they can take a beating and keep right on going. Not much in one of them to wear out. Mine had a low ground and high ground then two rows of holes with different settings to change the voltage. Forney are also great people to work with. Even though the welder was very old I contacted them and told them I had a Forney welder and was looking for information on them. They sent me a Forney manual for a Forney welder, it wasn't for the one that I had but it had a lot of similarities to the one I had.   I was over at one of our old neighbors awhile back and noticed the guy there had an old Forney welder setting outside of his shop. I asked him if it still worked. He said it works like a charm I never got around to asking him what type of rod he uses when he welds with it. When I discussed the problem on some of the forums years ago about the welder not wanting to burn the 7018 I had several tell me I just wasn't running hot enough. I tried with the old forney as  high as it would go with poor results.
Reply:I found an old picture of the Forney welder I used to have. If you do a search on this forum you will probably also find a lot of good info about them. Attached Images
Reply:Looks very much like mine, tho mine has  dc battery charger in it and the lay out is a bit different. Ive got mine cleaned up a little and will take a pic tomorrow-----  as for the 7018 it wont burn at any heat on this welder.  I tried some 6013 with great results.  maybe i will get some 7014 and try it too..
Reply:Glad to hear the worked for you, I am sure the will work well for you also. You will need to make sure you have the metal shinny clean when welding with the 7014 or at least I did for good results.
Reply:Here is a pic of the old Forney. welds fine with all but 7018(old rod)..  Will be pretty handy to have the big quick charger for car batteries.. Attached Images
Reply:Looks like a pretty nice welder. It would be a big plus to have the battery charger feature. I couldn't tell by the photo. but I imagine yours has a fuse for the 110 plug end similar to what I had on mine. I don't recall what the size of the fuse was on mine, but it was a pretty small  rating on it and I could not run much off of the 110 without blowing the fuse. It would operate a small drop light off it, but did not have enough to operate a hand grinder etc without blowing the fuse.