Chris Duke introduces you welding with the Handler 140 MIG welder and other accessories from Hobart Welders. Brian Karas guest stars.

Links

Hobart Welders
Rippin Designs

Episode Synopsis

A long time friend of mine, Brian Karas, updated his Facebook page a few months ago.  He posted a photo of a MIG (metal inert gas) welder he had just purchased.  I’ve always been interested in learning how to weld, so I asked Brian what exactly he was going to do with it.  He replied, and said he had to do some body repairs to his Ford F-150.  I expressed my interest to him about welding, and found out that he was fairly knowledgeable on the topic.  Brian (who lives on the east coast) offered to fly out to San Diego and help me shoot an instructional episode on how to get started with welding.  Of course I couldn’t turn down the opportunity!

I asked Brian which welder he recommended, and he immediately recommended the Hobart Handler 140 due to its ability to run off of 115-volt standard household current and still get quite a lot done with it, using gas or flux cored wire, working with thin auto body steel all the way up to 1/4″ steel.  It’s an impressive unit, and every garage should have one.  The list price is $628 but if you shop around online you can pick up the Handler 140 for as little as $465 at Amazon!

I contacted Hobart Welders and they were very receptive to the idea of an introduction to welding episode on Motorz TV.  They were kind enough to hook us up with everything we needed, and then some.  I can’t thank Hobart Welders enough for this amazing opportunity to work with their equipment.  It’s extremely easy to set up, use, and their website and manuals are also extremely helpful. This is quality stuff, folks!

Of course, one of the cool things about welding (besides melting steel together and hearing that awesome sizzling bacon sound) is the welding helmet.  For years I’ve seen some really cool custom-painted welding helmets, and I felt that Motorz should have its own!  I contacted Barbara Luck at Rippin Designs and ordered up a custom airbrushed paint job for my helmet, complete with lighting bolts as seen in the Motorz TV animated introduction, the MOTORZ logo on the front, a bunch of skulls on the top and sides which allows the helmet to scream “I’m a bad ass helmet”, and to top it off she added some blue flames around the sides and the front.  It came out perfect

I highly recommend Rippin Designs for airbrushing anything you want customized.  What surprised me most was her pricing was very reasonable and her work is better than most airbrushing I’ve seen in person and online.  You can see the helmet in close-up HD detail toward the end of this episode in “Partz”, or you can watch just the PARTZ segment here.

Episode Notes

Something I’m already getting asked is, who is Brian?  Is he a representative for Hobart Welders? One of the things I like about producing Motorz TV is that it’s produced by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.  Where it makes sense, we’ll bring in someone from the company to help with an install, but in this case Brian is not a rep for anyone.  He’s just like you–an automotive enthusiast who wanted to get some small welding jobs done and he figured it out on his own.  As you saw in this episode, it didn’t take him very long to get me up to speed with my first test weld, either.  I’ve already done a few small jobs around the house since we wrapped up this episode!

There is a lot of information online about how to weld, including Hobart’s own website.  They have an e-learning section, as well as an online forum called Weld Talk.  There are also many books published on the subject, or you can take the time to be properly trained at your local college.  Our goal for this first episode, “Learn How To Weld”, was to give our viewers a brief overview of how to set up and operate a MIG welder, as well as how to be safe when you perform your first weld.  Whether you choose to learn on your own, learn from a friend, or attend a school is entirely up to you!

We could have easily turned this into a half hour show, or perhaps longer, due to the amount of things we wanted to cover.  We are already planning future episodes that are more in-depth, offer real-world automotive welding scenarios, as well as working with a plasma cutter.

Your feedback on this episode is crucial to where we go next, so please take the time after watching this episode to post your comments below, or use our contact page.