Give Everlast serious look when you are ready to buy. Compared to the major brands (IE: red/blue, etc) their quality is good (
VERY good) for hobbyists and the prices are...well, comparatively reasonable.No matter what you buy, a TIG box is never going to be cheap. If it is, stop and have a serious look at what it is you're buying. If you're getting a TIG box in the hundreds of dollars, there's been some serious corners cut, either in quality, design, power or safety.
Avoid the multiprocess units.
I bought their Everlast 250 EX:
Does stick and TIG so it's considered a "multiprocess unit".
The thing is: TIG is essentially stick, so getting a TIG to stick is nothing more than a change of clamps and settings. The ones to avoid are the ones that advertise things like MIG/TIG/STICK/Plasma cutter. Too much in one box and something has to suffer for that "multipurposeness". Its like a gerber multitool: sort of works for everything, but does nothing well.
Not to mention, there are serious issues with a plasma cutter in the same box as...well, anything. Its the high freq interference that plasma creates that wreaks havoc on the other circuits stuffed in the same box.
I went with the 250 amp unit because when burning aluminum you need pretty high power to get it started. You really can't go too low in amperage for aluminum. Not that you can hit any thickness aluminum with...say...250 amps, but get much over 1/8" and you need to hit it with serious power to get it flowing. Things get pretty serious when you need more than 125 amps on aluminum; you need water cooled torches, water supply system, etc. Aluminum just spreads the heat so fast you have to hit it hard to get it to flow and start moving the torch right away, hence the need for high amperage. I'd also recommend
NOT getting a 120v tig. Mine is a 240 v unit. You need the higher voltage to give the high amperage/punch to get aluminum flowing. In fact, all my MIG/TIG/Plasma units are 220v. Just works better. Less portable, but works some much nicer when you need that extra "punch" as you materials get thicker.
You kinda have to get a "feel" for aluminum more than most metals. Not enough heat and it doesn't flow, too much heat and the base material just flows away and becomes a shiny puddle on the floor (hopefully not your boot!). You can even get the heat right and still get a big silver ball on the floor if you don't move the torch at the right speed or are not able to notice the change in the base material before it just "sloughs" away on you.
I've had my 250ex for a couple years now and it hasn't missed a beat. I just use it in my own home shop, but when I do run it I run it hard. No complaints.
) for aluminum I've actually had good results with those aluminum rods you can order ebay or Amazon you heat with propane torch. You want what you're doing to be really clean.
