MTS211Si not feeding wire

[mts211si]

I've had my MTS211Si for a few months and have several total hours of use on it in all three modes. I'm in the middle of a new project and noticed the mig wire wasn't feeding, but it started working and I figured I was missing something. While tacking things together there was some strange behavior and sputtering now and again but I ended up finished up for the night. Today I went back into the shop and the welder wouldn't feed at all. I took off the cover and looked for obvious loose connections with no luck. When pulling the trigger, the solenoids click and gas flows but there was no voltage to the drive motor. I kept at it and every once in a while it would turn a bit and then stop and go again. When this was happen I measured voltage at the motor and it would jump around and then go to zero when it would stop turning. It usually doesn't work at all though. Power cycling and switching between the modes does not seem to help.

Any advice? I need to get this fixed quickly so I can finish up this project. Thanks in advance.

[Rambozo]

Trace the wires from the motor back and reseat any plugs on the board that it goes to. Really sounds like intermittent connection problem. Usually if digital goes bad, it's all or nothing deal. You could also look for cracked or cold solder joints on the output transistors that make up the driver for that motor. That kind of thing can work when warmed up, but then not work when cold.

[TheGary]

I had the same problem with my MTS250S. What happened with mine is the wire conduit in the gun was arcing and I had to put in a new liner. Then it did it again in just a few minutes of use. I opened up my door to the wire and saw that the power terminal had gotten hot because it was blackened . I took the cover off the machine and the wire inside that connected to that terminal was loose and alowed the terminal to get hot and arc. So I had to put in a second gun liner and cleaned the turminal and tightened it up good. I called Ray at Everlast repairs and he wanted pictures of the damaged terminal so while I had it out to clean it up I took pictures and emailed them to Ray. He said that he had to get the parts from china because it is not something they have needed to keep in stock. He said it would take about a month, that was 6 weeks ago and I have not heard anything from him. I put mine back together with the old parts that had been cleaned and it has been working all right. I asked Ray if that would cancil my warranty and he said no. I hope this helps.

[mts211si]

Trace the wires from the motor back and reseat any plugs on the board that it goes to. Really sounds like intermittent connection problem. Usually if digital goes bad, it's all or nothing deal. You could also look for cracked or cold solder joints on the output transistors that make up the driver for that motor. That kind of thing can work when warmed up, but then not work when cold.

Thanks, I'll try to see if there is any bad solder on the driver circuit. When I did the voltage measurements described above, it was done at the back of the board behind the connector to the motor. This was done to take the wiring out of the equation, and prove that it was an issue with controlling the motor and not the wiring or motor itself.

I had the same problem with my MTS250S. What happened with mine is the wire conduit in the gun was arcing and I had to put in a new liner. Then it did it again in just a few minutes of use. I opened up my door to the wire and saw that the power terminal had gotten hot because it was blackened . I took the cover off the machine and the wire inside that connected to that terminal was loose and alowed the terminal to get hot and arc. So I had to put in a second gun liner and cleaned the turminal and tightened it up good. I called Ray at Everlast repairs and he wanted pictures of the damaged terminal so while I had it out to clean it up I took pictures and emailed them to Ray. He said that he had to get the parts from china because it is not something they have needed to keep in stock. He said it would take about a month, that was 6 weeks ago and I have not heard anything from him. I put mine back together with the old parts that had been cleaned and it has been working all right. I asked Ray if that would cancil my warranty and he said no. I hope this helps.

Okay, I'll definitely check this out too. If you get the chance, would you mind posting those pics here so I can refer to them?

Thanks again for both of your help!

[mts211si]

I think Rambozo is on to something... as a test, I powered on this morning and the drive roller was not turning again. I had the cover off, and used a heat gun to warm up the circuit boards from about 12" away. Every 15-20 seconds I would press the torch trigger and watch the roller. For the first minute or so, nothing happened. Then it began turning, and was turning at a very consistent pace (which had not been the case previously). It worked fine after that.

The temps have dropped significantly lately, and I've been turning on the heat in my shop at night. A rough guess is that the issue occurs when the temperature gets below 55 degrees or so. The intermittent nature of the problem is probably because the heater got the temp up to around 65 in the shop. The sputtering I mentioned in my first post started when I turned off the heat and opened a window, which matches up with the theory it could be a cold solder joint.

Unless someone contacts me here this weekend, I'll have to call Everlast on Monday to see if they can send me a new board, and I'll ship back the original. I really prefer not to send in the whole unit. If it is an easy fix that they can step me through, I'm willing to try that too. Thanks again.

[mts211si]

More details:

The stick function doesn't work when cold either. I let the unit sit for a few hours and tried to strike an arc with the stick function, but nothing. Warmed up the circuit boards similar to before until the drive roller started spinning when torch button was pressed. At that point I could switch modes and stick weld. I believe this means that the cold solder joint (or whatever the source of the issue is) affects more than just the feed motor. Note: the display, gas solenoids and fan all work when cold and don't seem to be affected.

[TheGary]

in my case the feed rolls kept working but the intermitted feed was drag in the liner.

[Rambozo]

More details:

The stick function doesn't work when cold either. I let the unit sit for a few hours and tried to strike an arc with the stick function, but nothing. Warmed up the circuit boards similar to before until the drive roller started spinning when torch button was pressed. At that point I could switch modes and stick weld. I believe this means that the cold solder joint (or whatever the source of the issue is) affects more than just the feed motor. Note: the display, gas solenoids and fan all work when cold and don't seem to be affected.

Sounds like a thermal issue for sure. Since the stick function is also out it is probably deeper in the circuit than the drive output. Look over the board with a magnifier or microscope. Look for poor joints, cracked traces, or lifted pads. Reflow anything suspect. Also this could be a thermal issue inside a component. Check any socketed components for bent pins and being fully seated. Because of safety issues, I'm hesitant to go any farther. But if you know anything about tracking down intermittent thermal problems in electronics, you can probably track this down with standard procedures. These are high energy circuits so if in doubt, send it in for repair. If you touch the wrong thing, it can and will kill you, before you can say whoops.

[mts211si]

Thanks again for the input.

Unless Everlast can point me to the specific area(s) I should be inspecting, I'd rather receive a new board from them. I played around with it more yesterday and this morning, and the threshold temp seems to be closer to 60 degrees F. Warm it up 5 or so degrees higher and things seem to work okay, although I did get some strangeness once in a while.

[mts211si]

Update:

I called Everlast on Thursday and spoke with support. He suggested a new board should be sent, and I could return the original using the same packaging. He then said I should call back and chose the Sales dept extension in order to speak with Oleg (who I purchased the unit from). I did what he asked and ended up leaving a call back number with someone else since Oleg was on another call. I followed up with an email to Oleg that reiterated the details and included a link to this thread. I haven't heard back yet.

[zoama]

Are you saying Oleg needs to approve this board exchange or is the part on it's way ?

[mts211si]

Are you saying Oleg needs to approve this board exchange or is the part on it's way ?

Sorry, I attempted to clarify my original post right after submitting, but the forum was acting strange and wouldn't let me click the edit button.

I was supposed to contact Oleg in order to get him to approve the shipment of a new board. Plus, the support rep said he didn't know which board it would be, and that Oleg would need to discuss it with the engineers in order to determine the correct one to ship.

[zoama]

I believe your part has already shipped. Working on tracking #

[performance]

Thanks zoama for birdogging that. I was going to try to check on it myself and had more things than I could handle yesterday.

[mts211si]

I believe your part has already shipped. Working on tracking #

Thanks zoama for birdogging that. I was going to try to check on it myself and had more things than I could handle yesterday.

Thanks guys. When you get a tracking number, please forward it along. Should I keep trying to contact Oleg, or am I really all set? Thanks again.

On a side note, if Everlast has any decals similar to the logos on the welders, maybe they could throw two into the box? They'd look good on my latest project, which is nearly done. I'll post better pics soon.

http://www.everlastgenerators.com/fo...g-cart?p=57999

[mts211si]

Oleg emailed to let me know he hasn't forgotten about me. He's waiting on a tracking number for a new board shipped direct from the factory.

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk

[mts211si]

Quick update...

I hadn't heard anything for awhile, so I pinged Oleg on the 31st but no word yet. I still don't know if I have a bad board or if the design needs a change, or if a replacement has shipped yet.

[mts211si]

Received the new board today and did some very quick testing in mig, stick and tig modes. It was about 50°F in my shop and it struck an arc in mig and stick without issue. Tig worked too, except for HF start. Not sure what could be the problem, it does lift start in either mode but no HF.

I noticed the original board had a chassis ground wire that isn't on the new version. Not sure if that is related or not. Posting a pic of the old one.



Thanks,
Kevin

[performance]

You need to transfer the wire to the new board...

[mts211si]

You need to transfer the wire to the new board...

Thank you. Oleg mentioned a new HF should be paired with the new main board and was looking into sending me one. I'm assuming the wire would still need to be transferred, regardless. Correct?

Thanks again.