Blew $120 on those fancy tungsten electrodes on Amazon

Thought I was getting a deal on a 10-pack of 2% lanthanated electrodes. Showed up and they were some off-brand that sparked like crazy and left a mess on every weld. Supposed to be 1/16 inch but half of them were way off. Anyone got a reliable source for electrodes that isn't a gamble?

3 comments

3 Comments

kim_johnson5123d ago

Right, so you basically paid $120 for a box of lies. Sounds like they were mismarked rejects from a factory that couldn't even get the diameter right. Amazon's great for cheap drill bits you can throw away, but for stuff like this it's a total crapshoot. Tara's right, those knockoffs usually are just bad batches of tungsten that some company bought for pennies and slapped a label on. I've had the same thing happen with a pack of "pure" tungsten that sparked so bad I thought I was starting a campfire, not welding. At this point you're better off just writing that $120 off as a "stupid tax" and grabbing a real pack from a welding supply shop. Even if it's 30 bucks more upfront, at least you won't have to fight with the arc for an hour.

hannah_perry23d ago

Honestly, that's the kind of thing that makes you want to throw your whole setup out the window. But here's something nobody's mentioning yet, @tara793 - those cheap electrodes might actually be contaminated with stuff that can ruin your gas lens or collet body over time. The dirt and impurities from the bad metal can get blown back into the torch head, especially if the arc's spitting like that. Plus all that sparking means you're probably burning through way more gas trying to get a stable puddle, so that $120 "deal" ends up costing you in argon too. Sometimes a bad electrode is more than just a bad weld, it's a slow bleed on your whole consumable bill.

tara79323d ago

I read a post on a welding forum a while back where a guy tested cheap Amazon electrodes against some from a known supplier like Blue Demon. He found that the knockoff ones burned through way faster and had more arc wander, which lines up with your experience. That $120 could have gotten you a solid 10-pack of the real stuff from a place like Arc-Zone or even directly from a welding supply house. A lot of the time those off-brands just buy up reject batches and stamp whatever size they want on them. I'd say cut your losses and stick with a brand that's got a reputation, even if it costs a bit more upfront. It's not worth the frustration of having to restart a weld because your electrode is inconsistent.