Miller Multimatic 200 Review
This week I wanted to take s few minutes to review a really good tool that I am asked about constantly... "What's a good welder to start out with?"... Anyone that knows about welding knows that this is a pretty vague question. Most people trying to get their home shop set up with a welder will underestimate the capabilities, or even how quickly they will outgrow that cheap Harbor Freight welder; or they will feel like they have to have the biggest and best TIG welder with more options than you will even know what to do with, let alone actually use... most guys in their home shop doing basic fab won't need custom AC waveforms, or customizable pulse settings.
So what makes my opinion worth listening to? I'm just another faceless idiot on the internet right? You're partially right... But aside from having a love for the off road world which has built my skill set from a builder standpoint. My full time job is as a Welding Team leader at a field machining company (Check us out here), I hold AWS certifications in Welding Inspection, and Welding Supervision, I hold welding certifications for all of the "normal" processes. Each job that comes my way has unique challenges, so I need to KNOW what equipment will be the right fit for the project. Sure, we have some really cool toys, and some serious welding power that we send all over the world to perform weld repairs, but we also have a few great small machines for when you need to pack light and perform a small repair in a tight spot.
One of my favorite machines in our arsenal is one of our smallest... but also has some of the best options, and welds silky smooth. It's a Miller Multimatic 200 CC/CV there was a LOT of skepticism when this little 40 pound baby sized machine came to us... So I put it to the test in an attempt to make it fail in our shop before taking it out on the road... It passed every test I threw at it without showing any signs of wanting to give up!
What can it do?
This little machine can do it all! Stick, MIG, Flux core, TIG, and even Spool gun for aluminum! The set up is super easy as Miller has done a great job of labeling everything well, and made every part rugged and easy to use. Wanna run some solid wire MIG for some suspension work? No problem, turn the dial to MIG and tell it the wire size, and material thickness, the machine sets itself! Wanna TIG weld some headers? No problem, Swap the work lead and plug in your TIG torch right in the front, turn the dial, set you tungsten size and material thickness and your ready to go!
It even has dual gas inlets in the back so you don't need to swap the lines! Need to go over to your buddies place and weld his trailer back together? And all he can give you is a 120v extension cord? Yup, you've got this. Swap the cord end from the standard 210v and the machine switches itself, hook up your stick lead and burn in that 3/32" 7018 like a pro.
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What CAN'T it do?
Now sure, I love this little machine, but it's not a power house. It isn't for heavy fab, and doesn't have AC TIG so you won't be TIG welding aluminum with it.
The bottom line is that this little machine is a perfect fit for someone that wants a serious welder in their shop that can handle whatever little project that might come their way, now at $2,500 with all the options it's not cheap. But when you think about the fact that this one little machine that can fit under most workbenches can do the job of three machines it takes the bite off a bit.
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