hi from cny

[wrenchmonkey]

Own a 140st from early 2016 & imig 140e from late 2016 (2017 model with 'new internals'?)
Long time solderer first time welder.
I've read many many many reviews of these 2 units & agree with the middle 90% of opinions. They are absolutely clones of other china products, but there seems to be a critical mass of a user base & a sort of warranty program. So far so good. Wondering who Gretchen International are... shady, or legit?

Located in sunny Syracuse where we used to make televisions, typewriters, cars, power tools, washing machines, diesel train engines, rope, almost everything. I thought I'd learn how to make stuff instead of fixing computers, so I left the IT world, switched to cnc swiss lathe lathe operation/setup, industrial pump setup/test, currently do metallography / materials testing.

The 140e did just fine with straight CO2 (from my home brew setup) but did snag some c25 mix. The HF 0.30 wire does fine. Haven't run flux core. On that note, the 140e previously came with a flux core knurled roller (per a youtube review) and now it doesn't anymore. Seems like a cheap add to attract first time buyers. I'd guess it's like a 40 second cycle to bang these out, I get the aftermarket revenue stream thing but just chuck it in the box.

[performance]

Wrenchmonkey.

Welcome...but.

You've sort of started off on the wrong foot here with ill informed and broad based assumptions and assertations. These are NOT clones of other China products. If anything other companies clone us. And we do not clone other US companies. We in many cases have pioneered a product class and type. Our product is not off the shelf and is produced under our supervision in the factory. We know our product. We come up with our product and we are not cloning anything here. Anyone can copy a design. As I've told people before, there's only so many ways you can build a square box for a welder to go in.

The 140E has never come with the flux core drive roll. It has never been advertised with one. And as far as a cheap add...everything adds to the cost and we want to meet our price point goal and maintain our alread lower than industry "norm" margins.

Also, will you elaborate with what snag you had on mixed gas?

[zoama]

I believe he's saying that he obtained a bottle of C25. "Snag or snagged" is slang for obtained.

[performance]

gotcha. I understand.

[wrenchmonkey]

ok not to believe everything I see on youtube but at 4:44 in this video we clearly see a flux core drive roller. As laid back as this west coast reviewer may be, he probably knows what a flux core drive roller is.
for your consideration:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mn2INokzj_s
he gives it a pretty positive review.
I am hardly ill informed, I do materials qualification for a fortune 50 company which includes parts & assemblies made in Europe, China, Mexico, & USA. Company A may make a box with parts inside from Company B which buys them from Company C, who changes their suppliers without input from Company A. Or, 3 manufacturers may all use parts from the same supplier but use different design & marketing.

[performance]

Well, that doesn't look like one to me. But if it was, it was bought in addition to. The welders come with the roller installed.

What you said doesn't have any bearing on our company...or our factory and it's practices. The units have to meet our specifications and they are listed and spelled out as the supplier and the description as they must continue to meet ETL and they have surprise inspections. The aspects of the machine not only have the manufacturer and part number listed in detail, but if they deviate from it, then it must be retested at significant expense. If you'd just spend some time on here, researching it before you pontificate, you'd see detailed documentation of our factory, production and even testing by the factory and US. It's not to say non significant part substitutions can't be made if needed, but design changes and cloning is a whole different ball or wax.