On-Board Welder

[jmbrowning]

Write-up pending...got too tied up in the Big Game

[NAILER341]

cool, but..
what made you think your ready welder couldnt handle your off-road welding needs?
:confused:

[jmbrowning]

Got tired of hoisting batteries. The Mobi-Arc will serve as the power source for the RWII.

http://www.readywelder.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10

I'm still bringing the RWII.

[BrockGrimes]

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

What is that, latin, spanish? I don't get some of it?
Anyone protection

[NAILER341]

do you have anything more to report on this mod?
i would like to hear whatever input you have on this.

[jmbrowning]

Hehe, no, I've been too busy with work...I won't disappoint you yet, Eric, just gimme some time!

[NAILER341]

well, it looks like i will be having this same system. i have received one of these mobi arc welders from a friend.
i am interested in more info as you get it.

have you had the opertunity to test voltages, and output from this unit?
from what i understand the voltage is increased with the engine rpm's. i am curious at what rpm's it is achieving 12,24,and 36~ volts. also what is the maximum voltage read.

if this works the way i am hoping it will... this will be one hell of a welding setup.
the ability to control voltage, and use the ready welder without having to disconnect all of the batteries will be nice.

[jmbrowning]

Well, let me tell you a little about mine so far. The wiring had me a bit confused so here it is with the bypass kit installed.

Carefully unplug all the unused wires in your harness, brown, orange, black, white. I did this fairly easily by rotating them in the plug til they fell out. This of course is with my stock Nippon-Denso alternator. Disregard if you are using another setup.

Violet goes to ignition hot 12v. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to find one. I used the pre-fuse end of a glovebox circuit that I can't remember now. I'll post later.

OK, there will be two other major bundles of wires that you will be running, one to battery and the other to the alternator.

First to battery, run the supplied #4 black cable from gnd post on welder to negative terminal on battery. #4 red cable from batt post on welder to pos terminal on battery. Also, in this loom run the gray wire from the harness to the positive batt terminal. The diagram shows to just attach it to the welder terminal, but it makes it hard to bypass the welder. All three wires go in the same loom. When running the wire, give yourself enough slack to connect it to the other wire bundle.

The second bundle of wires goes to the alternator. Remove the original charging cable that comes off of the alternator to the battery and shrink wrap/electric tape up the alternator terminal end and ziptie it someplace safe. Yellow #4 cable goes from the output post of the alternator to the alt post on the welder. The blue and green fused wires from the harness attach to the plug of your alternator. I tried the snap splices but they were too bulky. I just did a twist/solder/heat shrink tubing splice. I divided the field wires just before they come up away from the engine block. You might want to divide it elsewhere. Now, the bypass wires are a female socket that accepts the male wiring harness plug and you splice these unfused blue and green wires to the ECU end of the field wires that you divided.

Take the yellow cable, the unfused bypass wires and the fused field wires and put them in one big loom. You want the bypass socket and harness plug to have enough slack to plug into each other easily.

That's it for the wiring.

To bypass the welder, remove all the #4 cables from the back of the welder and bolt the red and yellow together and then electric tape it so it won't arc to ground and then plug the bypass socket on to the harness plug. This restores the original charging system to factory (with a few extra feet of cable).

Tip: If you use the 90 degree terminals on the #4 cable to attach to the welder you will need plenty of slack so you can bolt the terminals together. I used the straight terminals and put them back to back to bypass.

[jmbrowning]

Testing your setup

Ignition off
Check voltage between batt post and gnd post should be around 12v
Check voltage between alt post and gnd post should be between 0.4 and 1v less than above.

Ignition on (not started)
See the charge and ignition LED's light up.
Check for heat in welder and cables, none should be present

Start motor
Voltage between alt post and gnd post should be about 14.5 volts
Voltage between alt post and batt post should be 0.3 volts and decreasing. Increasing means not taking batt not charging.

Insert cables and quickly arc (I used a couple of inches of gas mig wire).
Charge LED goes out and weld LED goes on!
I had about 32-35 volts at a dead idle. I didn't have my hand throttle or wife to increase the RPMs to 1500 RPM.

Cool huh? Well, I put in a 6011 electrode in the stinger and laid a bead. Quick spit of an arc and nada. Looked up. No LED's. Bad ju-ju.

Checked voltages. No charge from alternator. Crap.

Bypassed the welder. Everything works fine now. The welder is going back to San Diego for Scott to look at it. I'm not too discouraged by it.

I had a chance to meet both Doc and Scott at Mobi-Arc when I bought it (I was in San Diego and stopped by on a Sunday to pick it up and tour the facilities). They are real stand-up guys and fun to BS with. Their lab/assembly suite is amazing with some very sophisticated equipment and just about every damn kind of alternator you can imagine.

As far as the welder goes, the voltage when welding is locked at 40v and current changes with how much gas you give the alternator. I don't have an ammeter that would handle the output from the alternator, but I'll fool around with the ReadyWelder settings and make a quick reference card to stick in the RW case.

I need to get a set of red quick disconnects that the RW uses and insert them in the stick welding cables so that I can attach the stick welding stinger and ground or pull them off and attach the RW.

The super trick setup would be to have the hand throttle and RW quick disconnects attached to the bumper or inside the dash, so that you never have to pop the hood to weld. Just need to keep the RW disconnect clean, because any poor connections builds up heat in the welder.

When I get it back, I'm going to get a cylinder of argon or argon/helium and try my hand at welding aluminum wire with the RW. Should be fun and expensive!

Hope it helps. I'll try to post pics of my bypass setup anyways and the Mobi in action once it comes back.

[jmbrowning]

Remember the welder voltage is pre-set at 40v (which is fine according to RW) and only the current varies by the RPMs you set with the hand throttle.

If you want to have set voltages other than 40v, you can ask Scott and Doc to get you a Mode Select Module for the voltage you desire. This will fix the output at whichever Module you put in the back of the welder.

These are modules are mostly used for jump-starting or boost-charging dead vehicles and batteries.

I suppose you could use them also to regulate the voltage of the welder.

When I get the welder back, I will be testing the RW with fixed 40v and use different current and wire speed. I don't know how much control this will give me, but at least it's more control than with serial batts (fixed voltage/current) and wire-speed alone.

[NAILER341]

thanks for all of the info.
that is quite a write up.
the 40v at idle is a hell of a lot. i wonder how well the ready welder will work at that voltage.
i see mobi arc offers the 14, and 28 v module kits for this unit, but it appears that those are for jumping other vehicles.

[jmbrowning]

Doc will make you a Mode Select Module for whatever voltage you want...even 20.6!

The voltage is no problem for the RW as the Premier Power Welder goes up to 70-80 and it is "certified" for the RW. I got the RW tech support guys to 'fess up to listing the Mobi as a "certified" DC source.

See my post as the "anonymous coward" here:
http://www.readywelder.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10

[NAILER341]

The second bundle of wires goes to the alternator. Remove the original charging cable that comes off of the alternator to the battery and shrink wrap/electric tape up the alternator terminal end and ziptie it someplace safe. Yellow #4 cable goes from the output post of the alternator to the alt post on the welder. The blue and green fused wires from the harness attach to the plug of your alternator. I tried the snap splices but they were too bulky. I just did a twist/solder/heat shrink tubing splice. I divided the field wires just before they come up away from the engine block. You might want to divide it elsewhere. Now, the bypass wires are a female socket that accepts the male wiring harness plug and you splice these unfused blue and green wires to the ECU end of the field wires that you divided.

this is where things get confusing.
i am assuming you have the same type nipenso [sp] alternator as i do.
there the main wire that goes from the alternator to the battery which is replaced by the yellow wire. i got that one.

where i get confused is the 2 green, and 2 blue wires that are fused.
it says the blue wires go to the positive "field positive", and the green to the field negative.

now on my alternator there is the plastic thing from the ecm that is screwed to the alternator which has 4 screws. the 2 in the center appear to be the + field. then there is one to the alt body, and one to the block. those are obviously negative.

my question is.. do i remove the wires that are currently attatched to the alternator, and run to the ecm, and tape all connections.. or leave those field and negative wires in their stock configuration, and attatch the blue on top of the positive ones, and the green on top of the negative.

i found nothing in the instructions about this area of the wiring.

i see in your picture you have green and blue wires going to something else... what is this about?



for as few wires as this is... it sure is a pain in tha ass to hook up. the instructions leave a lot to be desired.

[NAILER341]

this picture shows the part that was origionally on the alternator with the 2 center ones being the field +



this picture shows the alternator with their wires to it.

[NAILER341]

now do you expect that this gadget is sopposed to stay attatched to the alternator, and their wires get attatched as well?

i am now getting a check engine light, and ~11-12V charging, where it should be 14~.

reading the codes with the auto x-ray says that there is an open field positive on the alternator.
this is what leads me to believe that the gadget in the above pic should stay connected.

any insight?