This is for anyone who does TIG work. I'm posting it on a couple of boards so apologize in advance if you see it twice.

I have a 10 year old or so Miller Synchrowave 250 AC/DC welder, which has stick and TIG capability. There is a switch on the panel that allows three choices: Hi-frequency start, hi-freq continuous or off (scratch start). Scratch start gives an excellent arc and welds perfectly but there are occasions where I need the start-only feature. When I first got the machine, it started fine but I got a little arc wandering. However, the start feature has now stopped working completely so I am forced to use scratch-start. Does anyone know whether this is related to the points on the machine or a bad switch or something I have not considered?

Thanks, Hollis

check the switch with a tester first, and then if that is ok, check and see what the distance between the points is supposed to be.

Problem solved - the points were pitted and oxidized. I removed all four and wire brushed the bodies, then cleaned the spark ends with emory paper and finished with bead blasting. Coated with WD40 and reassembled at .008 gap. Arc starts fine at about 1/8 gap from the workpiece and welds just fine.

as an aside, my plasma started actin stupid ( sparks). Turns out I had grinding/plasma dust in the points. I cleaned it up and works fine. I pue a piece of scotchbrite in front of the air inlet. Welding supplier was here Christmas week and suggested I use a piece of furnace filter instead. Like to have a syncrowave Hollis. Big one ( pulse ).

Ten Hammers,

That Synchrowave is a real machine. It's quite lovely welding with it as I learned to stick weld on a Lincoln AC cracker box, which is OK but the Miller is just so smoooooooooooth...and the TIG just takes the cake for performance. Get one if you can - you won't regret it.