homemade spot welder!

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Original poster: "Mr Gregory Peters by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <s371034-at-student.uq.edu.au>

Hello all, 

A bit off topic, but you guys may be interested, as us coilers tend to 
make all sorts of enclosures etc. Last night I made my own spotwelder 
because I was making a sheet metal cabinet. I got an old MOT and 
removed the secondary windings. I replaced the secondary with about 3-4 
turns of very heavy welding cable, insulated copper pipe would do. I 
hooked the cable to two electrodes (old sharpened bolts) One of these I 
placed in a vice, the other was a free electrode, held by hand. It 
worked quite well when I got the alignment right. If you made a proper 
clamping system, it would work as well as any commercial unit. The unit 
seemed to work fine without any curent limiting. Just thought you may 
be interested. Good for making transformer cases, power cabinets, etc.

Cheers,

 
Greg Peters
Department of Earth Sciences,
University of Queensland, Australia
Phone: 0402 841 677
http://www.geocities-dot-com/gregjpeters