Picture of the broken item would help.

Small stuff is more difficult than larger items. So easy to burn holes right through the work.
Pinhead want everything to be pretty. More expensive equipment yields better results.

Seems like most pinball repairs could be done with a TIG welder. I do my repairs with a MIG and it does good if I turn the settings down.

I usually go to my local welder if it is something like a scope or ramp.
I pay them with a case of beer or a cake or something.
They love to see me coming !
Always perfect results and happy faces !

Dont forget, its not just the tig machine . you’ll need inert gas also, a quality mask .. and practice.

But having a good quality tig welder in your tool selection will give you years of pleasure, for all sorts of household jobs too

Hence my desire to see a picture of an item.

Thin stuff is real tough to do. Usually you end up with a large weld that you end up grinding off 75% of the weld to get to the finished product.

TIG is better than MIG, but TIG you have to spend considerably more for quality equipment than MIG or you are wasting your time even trying TIG. TIG also demands some practice for those perfect pretty welds, takes longer to master.

Been welding with MIG (Aluminum and steel) for 35 years now, it is pretty easy to pick up with a half way decent welder. I have a Lincoln 110V unit I do most of my steel work with and for what I do works fine.

FYI once you learn welding not only will you be able to fix stuff that normally might get tossed out you have the ability to make tools to make jobs easier, fabricate almost anything you can think of in steel or aluminum and make some tidy money repairing stuff for other people. I'm constantly repairing hospital beds and get paid $75 for 5-10 minutes work.

The Navy sent me to heliarc/TIG school to learn the skill. 3 weeks of welding stainless test panels followed by 3 weeks of welding aluminum test panels. I got pretty good at school but back at duty station the need and opportunity for me to keep welding was pushed to the side. Within 60 days I could barely strike a bead.

Your hospital bed gig makes me sorry I let the skill go.

I run a physical plant department at a nursing facility, the welding repairs are always a welcome extra source of cash for my hobbies. 2 months ago I repaired a bed with a broken deck which normally would have been replaced and saved the facility $1800.

Overweight clientele can wreak havoc on the equipment should they feel cranky.

Beds and dietary equipment make up the bulk of my welding repairs, my boss is appreciative as it saves a considerable amount of money compared to replacing the broken items.

Bed rail replacement runs $300-$400 a pop, $75 is a bargain and stronger than new when I'm done.

^ That's a perfect job for a TIG

Any local welding shop will fix that for $15, and it will be stronger than it was when it was new.

That would be a snap to repair with either TIG or MIG.

Quick tap with the gun, 5-10 seconds on a belt sander and you would not even know it was broken.

Any local bodyshop can do that. Give the guy $20 and it's done.

My dad does them for our games because he owns a machine and fabrication shop.

You need the machine, rods, gas cylinder, cleaning brushes (TIG has to be crazy clean), angle grinder, 220v outlet, gloves & apron, 100% cotton hoodie & pants, auto-darkening helmet, and some scrap material of similar thickness to practice on.

While I certainly encourage you to learn to weld, it's not something you just casually do.

I'd expect you would need about 4 nights of practice before you could weld that thin stainless nicely.

Just don't.

You will end up frustrated trying to use a cheap welder, when it comes to TIG you go big or go home. Buying a cheap TIG is not the way to go, a $500 110V MIG will however produce reasonable results for that thickness metal.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Lincoln-Electric-120-Volt-140-Amp-Mig-Flux-cored-Wire-Feed-Welder/1072945

Here is a fine little rig for MIG welding, pickup an Argon/CD tank from a local shop and start practicing. Take the flux wire and toss it out or throw it in the toolbox for an emergency. Don't be tempted to weld something nice with flux core, it is a splattery mess only fit for exhaust work IMHO.

With TIG a dedicated clean area is not out of the question, its that sensitive.

Is that from a TZ? If so, mantis amusements makes new ones with stronger welds.

You can only go gas-less if you are using MIG, that's what flux core wire if for. It is hotter and messy, not something that you want to use for thin stainless. To MIG weld that tab back you will need inert gas and thin wire.

I have a 110V Lincoln MIG welder. It has settings on the front (dials) for wire feed speed and amperage. The side has a chart for the settings depending on the wire size you are using and the thickness of the metal you are welding.

Been trying learning a little bit and it is frikkin hard . I'd say nickels or dimes are a bit far away... I'm at "a roll of Jack shit" aboot now.

Yep I've welded broken scoop tabs with it and wireform ramps. It usually takes a bunch of grinding down after welding but most often you never see it after it's installed.

I have been using a Lincoln 175 220v Mig (w/gas), and it worked great on the upper solenoid bracket that broke on the Death drop target on my Family Guy recently. Was back up a running in no time.
Mig is fairly easy for anyone new to welding.

I am a professional fabricator. Been tig welding for 28 years on mostly steel, aluminum, and titanium < .035” this entire time.

Tig is the most efficient, detailed, precise method of welding there is for thin material and would be the preferred tool for the majority of Pinball related fixes.

Tig, however, is also the process that requires the most skill to learn and time to master.

A simple at home system will require the basic machine with smart voltage, Air cooled torch, foot pedal or finger control, ground clamp with cable, tank of inert gas with flow regulator, non-consumable electrodes, filler wire in various sizes and metallurgic compositions, welding hood, light protective gloves, stainless steel brushes, and a bottle of high percentage alcohol and clean cotton cloth’s.

The most basic of systems can be had for around $1200 all in.

Acquiring equipment, however, is the easy part. Plan to invest a couple weeks just in learning welding process, theory, and basic set up before you will be able to run even an acceptable bead on flat material, let alone a corner bead on the scoop.

However, once you attain a basic fundamental level of skill, you will be able to weld thin material and have a finished product with no post fabrication touch up required.

Cheers,

Rody

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You really can't use a stick to weld thin sheet metal. A stick will burn right through the metal while trying to weld that tab. Best off MIG with gas or TIG.

Nice beadwork.

Let us know which model you decide on I might get one as well as I think this would be an awesome long term skill.

Yeah

I don't know how happy you would be with an $88 welder. I found the cheap unit to be quite frustrating.

The $1500(in 1995) machine is still a joy to use. One of those 'you get what you pay for' things.

Here are a few worn and broken pin parts that were fixed by mig....

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Tig will do the job.

If I had a tig I could do it. I was a pipe welder before I started a company.

Problem is tig takes a lot of practice with a lot of materials. And then stainless is a little bit trickier than carbon steel.

You could get away with mig but it would look worse.

You should also use a different gas mixture than you would use on the carbon steel. For pipes we would have to purge with nitrogen and use a different mixture of argon and nitrogen.

But if it's a hidden piece you could get away with a bit. Some of the ugliest welds can be structurally sound.

You can learn the skill but tig is the hardest to pickup and master out of the different methods.

If you take the plunge have fun and don't get too frustrated.

This is what my wife made me as a christmas gift for 2017.

Unfortunately never found the time, to test it.

I hope, she bought something good and I can learn welding

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"Maybe it's more difficult than I imagine."

HighVoltage ...I think you had it right from the start.

If you'd like the scoop fixed up for the cost of shipping, pm me. I'm feeling warm and fuzzy with the Holidays approaching, would hate to see you ruin it with flux core Mig and a grinder.

cheers,

rody

We do our own....

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/welding-service-for-ramps-ball-guides-kickouts-etc

I had actually never done any welding until this happened. Not all parts of a car are held together with screws and bolts though.

But I learned fast.
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Crash course in welding .

You got that right!

You can tell your kids over and over when teaching them to drive "slow down and stay away from the car in front of you!"

But I believe it was that airbag in her face that taught her the driving lesson I never could. It worked too. Three years later and not even a ticket.

That's like a 10 second TIG fix at an experienced shop. Versus thousands of dollars and many weekends learning yourself.

If a tooth is loose, do you go and learn dentistry?

Great analogy!