Diversion 180 - IGBT catastrophic failure

[Aeronca41]

I'm waiting on a return email this morning to verify the part number between two choices, but Mouser Electronics has them for $6.50 each in quantity less than 10, and $5.53 for quantity of 10-25. With estimated shipping it appears it should be around $20 for a couple of them.

Wow! That is a pleasant surprise. Thanks for the info.

[Auto_Tech]

Scary -- I'm in the market for a new TIG and it's obvious Lincoln's warranties are quite a bit longer than Miller's. I love my Miller machines, but Lincoln beats the daylight out of them on warranties. Miller needs to step up to the plate and at least match Lincoln.

[Auto_Tech]

I don't have the schematics for this 180 -- can someone confirm if these failed IGBTs are the ones doing the "heavy lifting" switching the DC input power into the high freq waveforms. I think they're running north of 20khz ........

[chuckies76ta]

I too have the Diversion 180 Tig welder that is on it's second board. We have almost $3500 into this welder with a max of 12 hours on it. It has cost us $300 an hour to own this machine. No support what so ever from Miller. I have found that the IGBT transistors are blown on the main board. I've also ordered new transistors that have arrived here and will be installing them in the next few days. Will let you know how that goes.

We have sent Miller email about this machine and absolutely no reply. It's obvious this machine has an inherit defect and should have had a recall by the company. People aren't screaming load enough to get Miller to listen.

At $1000 to $1500 to replace the main board, your pretty must dead in the water repairing this machine.

I will never buy another product that has a miller name on it.. I am totally pissed at this company.

[chuckies76ta]

Do not buy this diversion 180 welder as the main board on these units cannot handle the duty cycle. A load pop was heard on ours and we are now in the process of replacing the IGBT Transistors.

[MAC702]

I too have the Diversion 180 Tig welder that is on it's second board. We have almost $3500 into this welder with a max of 12 hours on it. It has cost us $300 an hour to own this machine. No support what so ever from Miller. I have found that the IGBT transistors are blown on the main board. I've also ordered new transistors that have arrived here and will be installing them in the next few days. Will let you know how that goes.

We have sent Miller email about this machine and absolutely no reply. It's obvious this machine has an inherit defect and should have had a recall by the company. People aren't screaming load enough to get Miller to listen.

At $1000 to $1500 to replace the main board, your pretty must dead in the water repairing this machine.

I will never buy another product that has a miller name on it.. I am totally pissed at this company.

To what email address are you attempting to contact Miller? Have you called them directly at 1-800-4-A-MILLER?

You've only got 12 hours on a machine that is already out-of warranty? I agree that's bad. From whom did you buy it where you aren't getting support there, either?

[shootist2]

Getting clear miller engineers don't quite have a good understanding of solid state circuits. Their old stuff was great.

[chuckies76ta]

I contacted them directly on their website. Not even a follow up email, phone call, nothing. The submission was sent and verified from Miller with an automated email to me confirming it was sent. The machine we bought about 5 years ago. Out of warranty. Were on our second board. Gonna try replace transistors. We build and welded a roll bar in my wifes 68 Firebird and other small jobs over the five years. It doesn't even have the 12 hours of use on it.

I was told by a reliable source that the machine has to be powered up every so often as it has something to do with some solid state parts in the welder. I can't remember exactly what it was but something to do with a crystal component drying up and not functioning properly after, if not used.

Anyhow, very disappointed with the division 180 welder. Like I said before, it's an inherent design problem, and nothing is getting done about it. Nobody cares obviously. Different consumers have posted right here under Millers nose and nobody from the company has even taking the time to respond.

[aametalmaster]

I contacted them directly on their website. Not even a follow up email, phone call, nothing.

And did you call them?...Bob

[chuckies76ta]

And did you call them?...Bob

Hi Bob: I called a couple of times and they were closed, so I sent the email online hoping they would respond.. That when I became so frustrated.. I will call next week. I called them on the first board and they were no help except for cost $1300 US for a new board. I sent the email to them to open up a dialog with respect to the new board. It's just over a year old. Anyhow, I will call see what happens. Thank you.

[Crepe Myrtle Farmer]

Do not buy this diversion 180 welder as the main board on these units cannot handle the duty cycle. A load pop was heard on ours and we are now in the process of replacing the IGBT Transistors.

NONSENSE -- I've been running mine for many, many months at a reasonable duty cycle and it's performing great. You're (I've seen some of your videos) probably running this machine at "industrial" / "production" type duty cycles ---- wasn't designed for that (per the Miller specs, brochures --- they call it PERSONAL USE (meaning light), up your game and move up in class to a bigger machine.

Besides (I'm a retired EE), the IGBT designs in ALL machines of this type are nearly IDENTICAL -- component quality may differ, but the designs are well known, well deployed across all competitors.

[chuckies76ta]

Interesting, Where did you see videos?

[chuckies76ta]

And did you call them?...Bob

Well, I called them. No warranty of course. That I already knew. Guy said he will work with me to get a PC-1 board that works. Cost not sure yet. Ahhh, Were gonna try a repair see what happens. If that works, I'm gonna install a fan to remove excessive heat from heat sinks and cross my fingers.

From what I understand and keeps coming up, is that these machine are really only rated for a 10% duty cycle. There not built to handle demanding jobs. At this point I'm not even sure how to explain that. I guess it would be like pulling a 10K trailer with a gas 6 liter and then moving to a 6.6L diesel.

If you want more performance out of a machine you need to spent the bucks and move up to a machine that will handle your work load, even if you only use it as a hobby and a couple of time each year as we did.

If any of you have a PC-1 board that has failed, can you private message me. Thank you

[Arizona Joe]

... From what I understand and keeps coming up, is that these machine are really only rated for a 10% duty cycle...

That's exactly what the spec says.

[aametalmaster]

That's exactly what the spec says.

Yup. Lots of machines are like that. That's what turned me off of buying the Multimatic 200...Bob