Hey everyone,
Has anyone every heard of Longevity?
I've been looking into buying one of their MIG welders. They looks like great relaibale welders and the price is in my range with a 5 year warranty.
Just seeing if anyone has had any experience with their company? Or any suggestions?
Thanks.

Here's the welder I'm looking at:
http://www.longevity-inc.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=migweld...

I bought a Lincoln last time, lots of places that can repair it if it breaks. Not any repair places for the longevity.
I have a harbor freight wire feed welder I got for 99 bucks, does the same as the longevity 200. Add a nother 45 bucks and you got 3 years to return it for a complete replacement.

I personally wouldn't spend less than $400 on a mig unless you are buying used.

Welding equipment is rated by "Duty Cycle". Duty cycle tells you how many minutes in a 10 minute period it can weld without overheating. A 20% duty cycle machine can only weld 2 minutes out of 10,or it will begin to O'heat. That may be fine for garage stuff but thicker material will require some additional preheat to get decent results,or a higher rated welder.

Quote: Originally posted by JhonnyMan

Has anyone every heard of Longevity? I've been looking into buying one of their MIG welders.

Like a lot of things; it's complicated.

Have you ever welded before; any experience? How much do you plan on welding and what do you plan on doing with the machine?

For the price; it's not that much cheaper to make it worth it over getting a Miller/Hobart/Lincoln.

The Longevity machine is going to have extremely poor resale since the brand is unestablished and still has a "fly by night", "here today, gone tomorrow" feel to it. These various no name machines have been around for years.

You can sell off a brand name machine instantly for a good price. You can get a used one at a good price and be confident with it.

From what I've seen; I'm not impressed enough by either the price or the performance that I'd ever drop the money on one. If the machine was half or more the price of a brand name machine; they might have something.

The profit in welding is not in the machines but in the consumables for the manufactures.
This is the razor blade model where the major name machines are sold at close to cost to get the consumable business.
The machines may look expensive but they actually put a lot of quality into the designs.
Hobart and Miller are both owned by ITW. Hobart welding machines for a while were owned by Thermal Arc.
Hobart is important to ITW because they sell lots of welding wire as does Lincoln.
Thermal Arc owns other consumables like Tweco, Victor, Thermal Dynamics (plasma cutting eats tips), Stoody (hard facing materials).
Look at your local welding shop - how much of their space is in gas bottles?

Weldngod mentioned duty cycle - it actually gets a little more complex - he is probably used to really BIG ass machines which are conservatively rated at 100%
Machine 1 at 60% might really be 30% at the max power but 60% at the speced power level.
Machine 2 at 60% might really be 60% at max power and only slightly below that power level it is 100%.
So you have to read all the details.
And is that 60% for the 1st 20 minutes or after 8+ hours and the machine is at max temperature.

And what is the duty cycle of the gun - it is often much less than the machine for mig welders.

Another issue I have cared about is how nice is the arc (which is really what kind of output inductor is used in the machine and how stable is the power)
Mild steel is easy - other materials are not as easy to weld.
Big machines use 3 phase power - so the output is more stable because you have 6 rectifier pulses per cycle of the power line and never drops to zero volts.
Smaller machines use single phase 240 power - so the output has 2 rectifier pulses per cycle of the power line.
So a Miller big machine on 3 phase power - welds a lot nicer than their 250 amp machine which runs on single phase.
A Lincoln 250 amp machine has a larger inductor than the Miller which stabilizes the current and IMO welds nicer because of it but it also ran about $100 extra so Miller totally won the market.
Old Hobarts like a FabStar were smaller (300 amp) 3 phase machines with large output inductors (often split for 2 sizes) and weld amazingly nice.

Check the price of the consumables carefully:
What is the price for the drive setup for different sized wire.
How hard and expensive is it to get tips (buy extra - with a small machine you are going to weld the wire to the tip multiple times at first).
Welding wire costs a lot more in smaller spools and some types are just not available.
What is the price and options for a replacement heavy duty gun etc.
For example - for a Miller the parts and lots of heavier duty guns are at your local welding store.
Even Lincoln parts are harder to source because Miller won the market.

You might want to read up on spray arc mode welding as it requires a heavy duty gun.
(you probably do not care but might want to know about the tradeoffs)

If you are new to welding just buy one of the Auto darkening welding helmets.
Other safety equipment like gloves.
Always think through what air your are going to be breathing...

A Gas source setup ($s) works much better than flux in the wire.
If you buy tanks - know that welding company 1 may not refill welding company 2's tanks.

Some of Longevity specs are more than a little confusing
60% at 200 amps or 160 amps - both are listed in different places?
11 lb spool or 30 lb capacity?

FYI - if you happen to have access to 3 phase power (not likely) then you can get used welders MUCH cheaper.
The market for an older machine is very limited because no one can use it in their garage.
For example, a nice/clean FabStar setup (Thermal Arc version which was identical to the older Hobart) can be found for around $300.
Check voltages - some machines can run 208 (common west coast), 240 (east coast), 480 - others are limited.
Look out for 380 volts (China+) or 415 (England+) as these machines will be very cheap in the US.

Thanks for all the info guys. Your forum seems to be the most helpful so far. I did more research on Longevity and gave them a call. Spoke with their sales and their welder over there. I had a decent budget going in but they took care of me on a PROMTS 252i which does MIG TIG and STICK in one machine. I was told it is made by the same factory that makes thermal arc stuff and it was a lot cheaper. They are doing a promotion. At 250amps, I got plenty of power and some options for the other processes. I hope it ships soon, and I will update yall when it gets here.