New PowerMaster 205 owner review (Another one)

[retusaf99]

I posted this over at WeldingWeb.com last week, but thought there might be some lurkers here that aren't aware of that very useful site:

Just a quick post to let the world know that Washington State (The Evergreen State) is a little greener after a PowerMaster 205 found a new home here in my shop. I placed a phone order with Alex on April 6, 2010 (Tuesday) and Brown (UPS) delivered the "green" on Friday, April 9, way faster than I expected.

The box seemed to survive ok, only one puncture in the side and no crushed corners. Packing seemed pretty good. The machine is cradled in a flexible (rubbery?) foam packing material that has some give to it, not the ridgid Styrofoam frequently seen. Good call on Everlast's part, because I know Brown can be brutal.

Everything looked good coming out of the box, and all parts that were supposed to be there were neatly packaged. The accessories are packed in a separate cardboard container inside the main box, and shield the machine from blows on one side at least.

Looking at the stack of cables, gauges, regulators, torches, stinger, etc., is kind of overwhelming, but my first impression was very positive, nothing looked chintzy (Well, except the pedal doesn't look as substantial as others I've seen). If this welder were a car, it's not a BMW or Caddy, but it's no Yugo either. Chevy or Ford maybe Hyundai? The argon regulator looks like a piece of lab equipment. The graduations are in liters/minute (0-25), and a fyi, a liter/minute equals 2.1188 cu ft/hour.

Just out of curiosity, I weighed some pieces on a bathroom scale. The bare machine weighed in at 54.9 pounds. The accessories tipped the scales at 18.4 pounds for a total of 73.3 pounds, not counting the box & packing. The UPS shipping label said 69 pounds.

The only problem encountered with the machine was the pressure gauge for the air filter/regulator. It had an undersized stem and bottomed out before the tapered thread would seal. I picked up a replacement at HF, $4.99 and we're good to go. (the gauge has 1/8" NPT (kind of...), other fittings are 1/4" NPT.)

Now, where to start? Smoke test! While fitting a NEMA 6-50 plug to the power cord (the power cord is a bit over 8 ft long, 12 gauge), I debated taking the cover off for a visual inspection of the innards. I saw in an earlier thread that Everlast Tech Support preferred that we owner/operators not open stuff without at least checking in with them. What the heck, plug her in and let her rip!! (I didn't connect any cables or gas/air at this point). I flipped the dual-gang power switch up, the green "On" led lit up along with the amp led's. The cooling fan lets you know it's there in a pretty big way, not shopvac loud, but way more than a computer fan!

I went through all positions of all the switches with power on. I was just looking for anything unusual, but everything looked and felt good. Decent quality switches, solid detents where they are supposed to be, pretty smooth overall. So far so good, no smoke or funny odors. Shut her down...whew... Everlast 1, UPS 0.

I liked the quick-connect idea for swapping gas/air lines when switching between tig & plasma. 91TSiguy posted some great pics of his setup and I really liked it. I thought I had enough HF bits and pieces to put things together, but unfortunately, getting an argon tight connection was frustrating and took 3 trips to my local HF to exhange defective fittings. Note: This has nothing to do with the plumbing supplied by Everlast. The HF stuff works ok for air, where I don't care about small leaks, but that argon costs...

I finally got a reasonably gas-tight setup after a lot of trial and error. There's a lot of variation in the HF air fittings, even out of the same package. Again, this was what I wanted to do, above and beyond what was "standard".

Couple of other notes:

The supplied hose is stamped 8x13, i.d. and o.d. in millimeters. That works out to about 5/16" i.d., and 1/4" barb fittings won't seal. (I tried that because that's what I had in the parts box. The HF 3/8" barb fittings do fit with some effort.)

Toss the included hose clamps in the garbage. Get some decent clamps. Number 4 Gold Seals worked for me.

While I finally got a set of air/gas connectors to work, be advised HF carries a variety of types or series of connectors: industrial, automotive, aro, high-flow, and Univeral (which universally leaked), brass and steel. In my experience, mix and match only if you like buying argon. I've never looked for better quality fittings, but I'd appreciate any recommendations.

When my cart arrives, I'll probably move the air filter unit off the back of the machine to some other location on the cart. Hooking a big honking air hose to the filter unit seems to really get in the way, and quick-connects seal better in a vertical position. Just something to think about.

I wanted an extension cord to give me more places I could plasma cut without burning the shop down. My local electrical supply place wanted $1.73/ft for 3 conductor 10 gauge stranded, 600v cable. Instead, I bought a 50ft outdoor extension cord, 10-3, for $54, cut the ends off and added my own plugs. I'm thinking of cutting the 50ft lenth into 20ft and 30ft pieces, and using the 20ft piece to replace the existing power cord. That will give me a really useful length attached to the machine, and a 30ft extension when I need it. That won't void my warranty, will it??

For the actual welding, my former welding instructor came over to check out the new machine. We didn't test the stick, but the plasma and tig on mild /stainless steel and aluminum worked very well after a few minutes of figuring out the controls. He thought it welded and cut just like the big guys, and is thinking the PM 205 might be a nice addition to his stable of welders. Me, I was happy I could make an arc. The videos and photos posted by others are representative of the results we got (my instructor at least). No meltdowns or malfunctions that weren't "operator error".

All in all, I'm very happy with my purchase. I have no connection with Everlast, other than a satisfied customer, and so far so good.

Doug in Vancouver, WA

[everlastsupport]

Glad you're happy like many others, wish all the happy customers would post, they just run off and weld.

Your post is large, more like a review, so I will not respond to every detail.

The extension cord, well, now that you told us about it, it might void the warranty. Just kidding.

The unit is not really that heavy when you consider there is a plasma inside.

We upgraded the foam a long time ago. We've come a long way, as you have found. Many still read the old posts cached on the internet.

UPS vs Everlast sales we win big time. UPS vs Tech Support, it is a tie. As we in Tech Support get the calls on the ones that really went wrong in shipping.

I personally get a lot of calls comparing us to a blue BMW and red continental. Mark does as well. I drive a Ford, weld with an Everlast. I lot of people that can not afford what they use at work have our products for personal use and like it better.

I would try the stick on it. I think you missed a nice feature there.

[91TSiGuy]

I'm glad I could help spark some ideas with the layout of the quick disconnects for the air and argon feed. My fittings came from Lowes and are Kobalt labeled if I recall. Down the road I may swap them out for something provided by Victor or another company that's intended for oxy/acetylene use, but for now this seems to work fine for me.