Is is a 120V or 240V?  I have a 120V Miller and it starts acting up if I use an extension cord.  It works fine with no load but gets out of whack when trying to weld.  If your's is a 120 volt try it with just the standard cord right at an outlet and see if it still acts up.  I made a 10 foot long 10 gauge extension cord for mine and it cured the strange behavior.  Otherwise it sounds like it could be a fault.

What size wire and what type wire are you using?

Its 110 volt.  We connected it directly to the wall outlet and still the same.  Seem to come out of the end fine.  But once you weld it starts and stops by its self.

You should have someone watch the feed rolls to see if they are still turning when the problem occurs. If they are still turning but wire is not feeding they may not be set right. My 115 volt Lincoln had an adjustment on the tension for the drive rolls and you should make sure it is set per the manual. Mine has a wing nut that compresses a spring to get the right squeeze.Since I adjusted per the manual and run the good Lincoln wire, I have not had an issue. Also the wire can stick in the tip of the torch, if your contact tip is too old. 

DC wrote:

You should have someone watch the feed rolls to see if they are still turning when the problem occurs. If they are still turning but wire is not feeding they may not be set right. My 115 volt Lincoln had an adjustment on the tension for the drive rolls and you should make sure it is set per the manual. Mine has a wing nut that compresses a spring to get the right squeeze.Since I adjusted per the manual and run the good Lincoln wire, I have not had an issue. Also the wire can stick in the tip of the torch, if your contact tip is too old. 

Exactly what I was thinking.  I've had this issue as well, and this showed me where my issue lay.  I also found that over many years the feed guides (tubes on either side of the drive wheel) get crudded up and need to be ramrodded out with a piece of wire and blown clear. 

Also make sure your tip is clear and use anti spatter on the tip every so often.  Otherwise you can actually weld the wire to the liner and get a failure to feed and resulting birdsnest inside the machine, or a little piece of slag that will slow or otherwise impede feed. 
 

If its going off on a duty cycle cutoff then that would be explained by something on the board being weak. 

Steve69 wrote:

Its a newer Lincoln Welder. 

Thanks for the help
Steve69

 
Is the welder still under warranty? You might want to check into it. Do you know the welder model and duty cycle? Even with a low duty cycle welder it's pretty hard to exceed the duty cycle welding on our cars as we trend to use plug welds or short length welds and move around, which takes time and allows the machine to cool down. Now if he's welding a non stop 6' weld on a floor seam...

I certainly wouldn't recommend WD 40 anywhere near my welding wire or weld. Anti spatter spray is meant to be used for welding and might be a better idea, but I've never done that either.

I will just throw this out there.  When my Lincoln weld pac  mig started strange wire feed issues that couldnt be corrected by any other means, it turned out to be a kink in the cable liner.   The very center core the wire travels through to the MIG tip, it looks a lot like an old throttle cable on a lawn mower.   

senzstang wrote:

Greg B wrote:

I will just throw this out there.  When my Lincoln weld pac  mig started strange wire feed issues that couldnt be corrected by any other means, it turned out to be a kink in the cable liner.   The very center core the wire travels through to the MIG tip, it looks a lot like an old throttle cable on a lawn mower.   

I think you're on to it Greg.  This is worth a try.  I was in welding industry for 12 years and dealt with a lot of the small 110 Lincoln units.  If the unit is 10 years old, try the new cable liner.  Dirt, copper flaking off wire, kink will all lead to feed problems.  They are cheap and easy to put in. 

So since there is no dumb questions?...LOL  What's  a Cable Liner?  
 

TKOPerformance wrote:

The torch head is connected to the cable.  The cable is a protective sheath made from heavy rubber.  Inside that sheath there is a liner, typically made from steel for steel and stainless wire.  The liner looks like a very tightly wound coil spring with a small inside diameter, where the wire feeds through.  If you remove the gas shield at the torch tip, and the wire feed tip you can see the end of the liner.  It typically pops out about 1/2 to 3/4" when you remove the feed tip. 

   Great!  Thanks for the info! 
 

Nozzel gel will reduce the splatter build up.  I use it liberally inside the nozzel and on the tip.
 HF sells a brand that works well.

Last edited by Rudi (8/22/2017 10:40 AM)

Rufus68 wrote:

You say it feeds fine when not welding and stops feeding when welding.  Heat is a difference between these two conditions.  Perhaps you have a dirty tip that is pressing on the wire when it heats up.  Try it with a new tip to verify that the tip you're using isn't the issue.

 
That is an interesting thought. Those screw on tips come in sizes, maybe the tip on the gun is too small for the wire size. A quick look showed that Various Miller mig guns take tips from 0.023-0.081". Common non-commercial mig wire runs from 0.025-0.045. Easy to check.

A friend of mine says he uses Vaseline on his welding tip.  Never heard of that before.  He said it works great.  When I went to pick up more Shielding Gas I dropped the Welder off to have someone take a look at it.  Ill let you all know what they find out.  rpm it would stop and then burn all the way to the tip.  

Thanks Steve69