Syncrowave 180SD Not Working

[180SDHelp]

Picked up a used 180SD on Craigslist for a decent price. Box looks almost brand new, showed 7h8m and 1031 arc cycles. Get it home, get the tank filled and start (trying) to weld with it. It's acting crazy. Wants to only give me HF but not throw an arc. Fiddle around with it some and it finally thows an arc and seems to weld like it should then after about 30 seconds it starts stuttering/making a thumping sound and goes out. Then more HF/no arc. Now I keep getting HLP-1 in the mix of all this. I'm hoping I didn't get swindled. Haven't tried stick yet, just got it online last night and was frustrated. Made sure all connections for the torch and ground were tight. Basically everything outside the welder seems in order.

I'm hoping it isn't the PC board, but I'm going to dig into it today. Any troubleshooting tips? The book isn't too helpful for troubleshooting. Says to take it in. I'd really not like to spend a hundo finding out it needs $900 board. I have pictures of it and a short clip of the way it is welding if you want to see it, just LMK. Thanks in advance for the help. I'm an electrical engineer so I plan to tackle the board repair myself before replacing it. I was born for this is suppose.


SN: LC300516 Late 2002 model I think.
Stock #:9607054

[H80N]

Picked up a used 180SD on Craigslist for a decent price. Box looks almost brand new, showed 7h8m and 1031 arc cycles. Get it home, get the tank filled and start (trying) to weld with it. It's acting crazy. Wants to only give me HF but not throw an arc. Fiddle around with it some and it finally thows an arc and seems to weld like it should then after about 30 seconds it starts stuttering/making a thumping sound and goes out. Then more HF/no arc. Now I keep getting HLP-1 in the mix of all this. I'm hoping I didn't get swindled. Haven't tried stick yet, just got it online last night and was frustrated. Made sure all connections for the torch and ground were tight. Basically everything outside the welder seems in order.

I'm hoping it isn't the PC board, but I'm going to dig into it today. Any troubleshooting tips? The book isn't too helpful for troubleshooting. Says to take it in. I'd really not like to spend a hundo finding out it needs $900 board. I have pictures of it and a short clip of the way it is welding if you want to see it, just LMK. Thanks in advance for the help. I'm an electrical engineer so I plan to tackle the board repair myself before replacing it. I was born for this is suppose.


SN: LC300516 Late 2002 model I think.
Stock #:9607054

First off....Doublecheck your ground/work connection & clamp.... TIG torch too..

Crappy ground clamps and normal looking but damaged TIG torches cause frequent and sometimes intermitant grief

Does it stick weld OK...??

Here is the manual

https://www.millerwelds.com/files/ow.../O360A_MIL.pdf

.

[cruizer]

Well, hlp 1 basically means that the unit took a surge right off the bat. unlikely to be a circuit board issue though. Best remove your right side cover and check the condition (blown out sides) and tightness of the screws bars on the SCR pack
Now the big problem is that little blue transducer (HD1). this is your likely culprit. What I would do is merely turn the unit on, and not weld with it for an hour to balance everything out.

[180SDHelp]

First off....Doublecheck your ground/work connection & clamp.... TIG torch too..

Crappy ground clamps and normal looking but damaged TIG torches cause frequent and sometimes intermitant grief

Does it stick weld OK...??

Here is the manual

https://www.millerwelds.com/files/ow.../O360A_MIL.pdf

.

I did check all of the connections with the ground, clamp, and took the torch completely apart and tightened up the fittings on both ends at the DINSE and the Torch. The ground clamp cable side was wire brushed and directly on the work (3/16 hot rolled ground to white metal at the ground and where I was working). I'll try stick tonight before I open it up. I didn't h ave time last night. The stick lead has never even been out of the factory zip ties. Only thing out of the ordinary I noticed about it externally is the ground dinse connector is a tad loose inside the machine. It twists about a 1/16th of a turn when I tighten or loosen the connector.

[180SDHelp]

Well, hlp 1 basically means that the unit took a surge right off the bat. unlikely to be a circuit board issue though. Best remove your right side cover and check the condition (blown out sides) and tightness of the screws and bars. Now the big problem is that little blue transducer (HD1). this is your likely culprit. What I would do is merely turn the unit on, and not weld with it for an hour to balance everything out.

I will check this tonight and report back. Will take pics and make notes of what I find.

[H80N]

I did check all of the connections with the ground, clamp, and took the torch completely apart and tightened up the fittings on both ends at the DINSE and the Torch. The ground clamp cable side was wire brushed and directly on the work (3/16 hot rolled ground to white metal at the ground and where I was working). I'll try stick tonight before I open it up. I didn't h ave time last night. The stick lead has never even been out of the factory zip ties. Only thing out of the ordinary I noticed about it externally is the ground dinse connector is a tad loose inside the machine. It twists about a 1/16th of a turn when I tighten or loosen the connector.

"tad loose"...??? I would inspect and tighten that....

Listen and follow CRUIZER... he is a master tech on these blue boxes

[180SDHelp]

Agreed just didn't have time to open the box last night. I hoped he was still active and would help. I've read all the 180SD threads on this board and he's one common denominator in addressing these issues.

[180SDHelp]

Got the thing working last evening. Took it all apart, blew it out, tested DC voltage at the control terminal. All seemed good.

It actually welded fine for a few minutes before I started. Then I noticed the voltage was reading and fluctuating around 5V with the pedal in the off position. I knew it acted up when the voltage didn't go back to 3 dashes. When I was testing the control port pins with my dmm it was consistently displaying 3 dashes until I triggered the a-b contact to fire the HF with a jumper. The. I looked in the connector on the pedal lead and saw it was very dusty and kinda grimy. Blew it out good and cleaned it up and that seemed to have fixed the problem.

Thanks for the help. It's good to know there are great resources available to help with issues with these blue boxes.

[180SDHelp]

I spoke too soon. It's till acting up. It welder for about 2 min then went to ****. Just sitting there it is bouncing around from displaying 3.0 to almost 6 volts. Pedal off. If I get it to sustain an arc it make a thumping groaning sound until the arc goes out.

[180SDHelp]

So I pulled the right side and checked all the bolts on the SCRs. I noticed the metal tabs coming out of them are wiggly but the hardware attached to them is tight. I wiggled everything to see what was loose and now it's working perfectly. Welding great. What gives?

[Andrew J 649]

Glad you were able to sort that, but i'd love to see these last images bigger. Ive got a 180SD, and it runs fine, but still i'd like to know more about what you actually did to remedy the issue.