Some of you might have followed my mini saga of ordering a Lincoln P/T 185, from WeldingMart, then canceling it, and ordering a T/A 185 TSW. Anyways, before I did, I decided to send a question off to "the recommended welder repair place" that Earnie (and others recommend), to ask them about failure rates for this unit. Their tech support guy sent me back a nice long response on the whole deal. I sent another E-mail back to them asking for permission to post the E-mail here (and the name of their company), and waiting his reply. In a nut shell, he said that they have not had
*any* repair orders on this model yet (in *or* out of warranty), although some of the other T/A models they've had very few. So this is the good news. The bad news is the cost estimate of what a typical repair would cost (involving failed power electronics switching elements like the IGBT) - close to $500. But what he sates, and how he describes it kinda does put it into perspective, so I'm hoping this tech support guy will give me permission on posting the entire E-mail. (I can't imagine what the ramifications would be)
More to follow. This all seems too good, and waiting for the other shoe to drop.