Power extension cable vs welder leads extension

It's going to be cheaper making an extension cord for the 220 side than buying heavy fine-stranded cable for the LV side of the box. Particularly these days with the cost of copper what it is. The difference is probably at least $4-5/ft.

Male and female connector sets are available, both online and at welding suppliers, there's no standards. Pick one type that's readily available, Dinse is what's coming in from Europe and the far east. Just make sure your connections to the cables on both sides are good, they'll heat up and maybe cause a fire if not.

Stan

The cheaper and more conveneient option (less weight) is extending the

220v power cable. i

project that

longer cables

Also the mains power cable can be used to power other remote devices wheras the lv cable is only any use on the welder

AWEM

Good point.

i

As the others have said, you will probably do better making a mains extension cable rather than having over-long welding cables (another reason is that, if you leave two separate 50ft coils of welding cable lying about when welding, you can get interesting heating effects near to them).

Assuming you are in the US, probably you will need to use NEMA L6-30 plugs and sockets or, possibly, one size larger. Specifically the twist lock or similar locking connectors to avoid them coming apart accidentally. I would personally prefer a connector like the BS4343/ CEE17 ones that are IP44 (splash proof) rated, but I don't know what the NEMA equivalent is.

I would imagine that you would want something like 133/.0112 cable, that's the equivalent of what I'm using for my 180A/9kVA oil cooled welder extension lead in the UK. That should be good for about 30A continuous use. You may well get away with one size smaller cable if you allow for the intermittent use that welders tend to get. Check with the local suppliers, though :-)

When you are using the welder inside the garage, merely plug it into the wall socket directly, rather than with the extension lead.

These opinions are worth exactly what you paid for them...

Regards Mark Rand RTFM

With the price of copper these days, it's far cheaper to make up a 240 volt extension cord. You can even cheat and use some NM-B cable instead of the proper rubber covered extension cord (SJ or similar). That said, it's far more convinient to have long welding cables and not have to drag the heavy welder around.

The real solution is to run the main power to a suitable spot just inside the door. You can weld inside in the open area or outside with the same cables.

For the cables you can buy male/female connectors at your local weld shop or on line. I have decided to standardize my equipment using the plugs and and jacks I get as Miller replacement parts. Run about $8 per plug or jack. I mount a jack on the welder front pannel, much neater than hveing stub cable hanging out.

The stock cables on the Tombstone are too short for anything other than simple bench work. Depends on what you are welding, I like to be able to work all the way around the project and still have some slack. So if you park a 16' trailer about 10' from the welder, you will want at least 30' for the stinger cable. The ground cable can usually be 10' to 15' shorter.

For your unit I'd suggest taking the longer stinger cable, making it the ground cable, buy a new piece of welding cable at least 25' long for the stinger.

Home Welder wrote:

You are going to get a tough lesson in global economics when you go to buy 50' of new 8SO3 cable, or even 10SO3 cable. Copper wire is really expensive now!

It will be a lot more work and expense to fit welding lead receptacles and plugs than it would have been to buy a welder with one in the first place, but sure, you can do it. But it makes way more sense to extend the power cord.

GWE

Just make yourself an extension cord of 10/3 romex. Use the same plug and receptacle as the welder requires. I have such a cord, about

150'long, that I use for my Miller Thunderbolt when I want to weld on a gate post or something similar that's not close to my house. You can put multiple receptacles on the end for using other machinery such as air compressors, even put a 110v receptacle for drills and saws.

To the question about removable cables, yes, a welding supply house can fix you up.

A pre-made 25 ft 8/3 220V 50A extension cable is $80.29 at:

A 50 ft one is $134.57...

If you are swapping the leads to the electrode holder and ground wire out, you're looking at needing a cable size of '2' according to:

According to:

50 ft of that (which will get you 25 ft from the welding unit) will run you $77.50... 100 ft of that (which will get you 50 ft from the welding unit) will run you $155...

As such, it appears that the 220V extension is a bit cheaper... If you wire up an extension cord yourself from parts at Home Depot, perhaps you might come out a bit cheaper... Either way, it doesn't look like there's going to be that much of a difference in the price one way or the other...

Considering the length of the AC-225's leads, I'm more inclined to suggest a combination of the two approaches... Extend the welding leads enough so that you don't need to move the unit around as much once you get it to your outside area AND write up an extension cord to get the welding unit closer to the area where you need to work... Personally, I'm not that crazy about putting a 220V outlet near the garage door since it is going to get wet from water dripping off the garage door and from a car when it is pulled into the garage... Of course, that's assuming that the garage still has room for a car to be pulled into it... That's not the case with many folks... I can still pull *one* car into my 2-car garage... The other size if filled up with a lawn tractor, a 600cc sport bike, and other stuff... I would love to extend my garage to a 3-car and a workshop in the back, but the f***in' HOA Nazis around here are rather anal about *everyone*'s house looking exactly the same... "You're going to have vanilla ice cream whether you like it or not!" Once my daughter's off to college, I'm going to move someplace with a crappy school district, low school taxes, and no f***in' HOA...

You do not need to have it pre-made. Just direct wire the welder to the wall.

i

I would love to extend my garage

When you buy into a place with a HOA, you marry it and there ain't no divorce. I am in the process of selling my place and buying one somewhere a lot cheaper. It took some doing, but I finally convinced the real estate lady to not even bother showing me anything where there is a HOA.

As it stands now, I have a place on the line with a shop building that is three times the size of the garage I have now...

I have my MIG welder on a cart, so it is easy to drag around wherever I need it. And I made two 50 ft. extension cords for it, one of proper rubber cord and the other of Romex for the rare occasion when I need to get well away from the shop.

Jerry

I made myself an extension cord (30 feet long, proper wire size, very flexible) about 10 years ago. Changed all my 220 equipment (3 welders plus lots of woodworking stuff that I like to drag outdoors to minimize cleanup) over to the same plug so I could use it with all my stuff.

Last week I thought that I would install a 220v outlet near my car hoist. Would need 42 feet of #6 wire (3 pieces) from the panel. Went to Home Depot for the wire and realized I didn't want to make a $ 170 investment in a new plug. BTW, the plug would have been only 22 feet from an existing plug, but, by the time you run up the walls, across the ceiling, back down etc. the footage adds up.

Will continue to use the extension cord until copper prices drop dramatically.

Ivan Vegvary

Let's just say that if someone decided to OJ this marriage and I was on the jury, I wouldn't vote to convict them... Hell, I might even volunteer the locations of a couple of creeks where the gators have been looking a bit undernourished...