Cheapest way to get a tig setup
 

What would be the cheapest way to get setup for tig welding? I want to be able to weld aluminum with a tig.

If you wanna do aluminum....your gonna have to pay. Most of the cheapie machines are DC only and you need AC for aluminum. There are some exceptions but I won't get into that. A good machine would be the Miller 180sd, I think its around $1700.

Yeah I know I need AC. I been looking around. I thought maybe someone knew of a cheap setup. I have a couple of mig machines and Arc welding I learned when I was a kid. I want to learn to tig.

you could just spool a mig wit aluminum we do it all the time.

Not sure but I think he wants to make aluminum tubers. If so, It would be very difficult to do on 3/16 to 1/4" tubing with a spool gun.

Yeah I don't think a spool gun would work to hot on small stuff.

brazing would be so much easyer. tig it would take more patients,

Don't think that would work with aluminum.

you can solder or braze aluminum just fine. just gotta make sure it is very, very clean.

i've seen people mig aluminum without a spool gun. so it can be done without one if need be.

I have a roll of aluminum wire and tried it once with my Lincoln but if you didn't have the torch line straight it wouldn't feed right. Guess I could try it with my trusty Hobart. I don't want to braze because I want to be able to polish it and make it look good.

Not sure what gun you have, but you can get teflon liners for Tweco's and if you keep your torch short you can push aluminum. I would not go less than .045 so it still will be tough on 3/16" material.