DIYbanter - Help with lincoln welders

I went to Lowes, they have a Lincoln Pro-Mig 140 for $438. I then went
to Home Depot and they have a Lincoln Weld-Pak 3200HD for $459.

Does anyone know the difference? Which one is a better one? The 3200
is 90/1/60. What is the 140?

They're probably the same welder. Lincoln rebadges their lower-end models
for different companies to sell. Plus the different companies up their
ratings occasionally to make their welders look better even though nothing
has changed.

For example, I have an older Lincoln SP-170T which is a great welder BTW.
The current version of this is the SP-175T and I've actually checked the
parts listing and found all of the important components and IIRC everything
except for the stickers and labels to be the same for both models. They
just upped it to 175 to make it look better. Hobart did the same thing with
theirs. They recently upped their Hobart Handler 135 to the Handler 140 so
Lincoln was bound to follow eventually.

They also have sold my welder as the MIG-Pak 15, the Weld-Pak 155 (the same
welder minus the gas solenoid and regulator), the Weld-Pak 5000HD from Home
Depot and the Pro-MIG 175 from Lowes.

The ones you're looking at have been sold as the SP-125T, SP-135T, Pro-MIG
135, 3200HD and probably a couple of others I'm not aware of.

I'm not sure what the 90/1/60 numbers are you referred to but a link to the
owner's manual and parts listing for the new 140 is available here for
comparison:

http://www.mylincolnelectric.com/Cat...et.asp?p=34014

One of the reasons, probably the biggest reason Lowes and Home Depot have
different models is so they don't have to match prices. They both have
price matching policies but it has to be the exact same model, etc. This
way they bypass it.

BTW, you didn't say anything about how you plan to use it. You may be an
experienced welder that knows exactly what you want so feel free to ignore
me. But if you're not please ask for advice here because the welders you're
looking at are good but they're limited so you might want to check into what
you can and can't do with them a bit more before buying.

For example, if you're assuming you'll be able to weld aluminum you can
pretty much forget it. They say it can be done but not realistically.

If you can swing it and the portability of a 110V welder isn't too much of
an issue you'll probably be much happier in the long run if you go with a
version of the 175 amp machine instead. I've had both so I speak from
experience. :-)

Best Regards,
Keith Marshall

"I'm not grown up enough to be so old!"