locaddy
+1y
Edited: 7/2/2007 7:30:26 PM by kadillakstyle
These were taken from Hobart forums, there were also plenty of good remarks on them also. I just figured Id give you an idea of some problems you could run into. I was thinking of getting this unit a few months back but the horror stories scared me away, Im currently saving for a Miller.
EDIT: I have absolutely no personal experience with this machine.
"Thought I would save a few bucks and buy a parker unit as we don't use plasma cutters too often. First one they sent gave me a good jolt to the floor then died (but not before the cheap torch switch broke). They sent a new one after receiving the broken unit back... 2 weeks. Second one was DOA, they had me open the case, and the nylon tie wrap (high tech circuit board support) didn't do its job and the flimsy board was snapped in half. It also gave me a chance to look at the electronics. I was glad the machine was dead because the horribly sloppy and cheap circuitry was obviously not going to hold-up. No third try for meNow have a Spectrum 625.
Purchased a Parker Metal Working Cut 40 five months ago. The unit has been replaced twice (three different units). The first was dead on arrival, and I spent 30 minutes on the phone trouble shooting the machine. Ultimately it was returned at my expense ($40) for another units. The replacement did function, but not well. Finially got fed up and called for help, only to spend another 30 minutes on the phone trouble-shooting again. It went back. Typically takes 10-15 days to turn the machine around once you call the tracking number in for east coast destinations. The third unit still will not cut 1/2 inch material, let alone the 5/8 inch it is rated for. The hose leading to the torch has blown off of the machine and the torch. The torch end is secured with clear fishing line. Parker refuses to refund even 50% of my purchase price! I would rate this machine at a 1/8 inch quality cut. At 3/8 inch the plasma arc wonders around at the bottom of the cut and makes a general mess. A 1/2 inch cut requires a very slow pass, twice, and a big hammer.
As mentioned elsewhere, the hose ends blow off of the hose barbs. If you own one of these machines, screw the handle off of the torch to inspect the connection. The hose is wrapped with clear fishing line. I had to replace mine with thin stainless wire wrapped several times and then twisted. Parker's biggest concern about my machine is the case cover. When the last machine was returned they specified that I keep the cover. They even needed to know what color of case I had so that they sent the correct machine for the cover. When the new machine arrived it had the cover installed, and it was of a different color, with Parker Metal Working proudly printed on the side. On this unit the plastic strain relief/insulator for the torch lead will not attach to the case, so the high voltage connection is exposed. I notified Parker of this the day it was recieved. Over a week later I got an email from them stating that I had to return the latest case cover that they sent by MISTAKE, or they would bill my credit card for it (unauthorized billing).
I bought the unit on ebay on 7/27 and received the it in a reasonable amount of time. I have no issues in that respect. After a couple of days I actually got around to doing something with it and noticed a couple things right off.
Most of the screws holding the case on were loose, two of them because they were just flat out stripped (the case, not the screws). The bottom right corner of the machine case was bent. Nothing major, but still. It "could" have been a shipping issue but it seemed to be packaged fairly tight with plenty of styrofoam.
There was a little zip up case included where you can store some consumables and your gun/ground cable if you wish. The gun has a protective sleeve over it much like you see on some tig torches, but although of decent quality, it's durability is going to be in question due to the material just being a light weight cloth of some sort.
The gun itself had two issues. The wires from the trigger terminate inside a plug that is much like the plug on a standard CB microphone except smaller. In spite of it's small size the wires just flop around where they exit the plug because the clamp on the plug doesn't tighten down enough to grip the wires. One accidental yank on the cable and you'd rip the pins or the wires right out of the plug. I fixed that by wrapping the wires with a bit of split tubing so the clamp had something to tighten on.
The second issue concerned the conducter/airline portion. Power gets fed to the gun through a twisted conducter that is encased inside what amounts to the airline that feeds the gun. Where all this attaches to the machine is where the problem was. Picture your standard barbed air fitting that goes into an air hose. Now picture the barbed portion having a small power conducter crimped to it. Barb and conducter are inserted into an air hose which has a tubular ferrule around it, and then the ferrule is crimped down so it pinches the airline between it and the barb thereby holding the whole mess together. My gun had the ferrule but it wasn't crimped, at all. It was just slipped on and would allow the hose to slide off the fitting which exposed the power conducter. That is what is known as "Not a Good Thing". A quick trip to the crimping machined solved that issue.
The regulator included with the machine was adjusted so far to one extreme (either high pressure or no pressure, I'm not sure which) that I could not turn the adjustin knob by hand. I tried so hard that the knob ended up splittiing on the inside where it's splines fit down over the internals. I ended up having to disassemble the thing. Inside was what amounted to a bolt that threads through a nut. It was adjusted up against the nut so hard I had to put it in a vice and get after it with a wrench to pop it loose. I put it back together and managed to get pressure adjusted properly but the adjusting knob was slipping pretty bad because it had cracked on the inside.
On to the machine. After I got everything reassembled I hooked up the air and gave the trigger a squeeze to get the air flowing so I could fine tune the regulater. On the second squeeze I heard a pop/sizzle whereupon all the factory installed blue smoke began to leak out of the case.
Exit one brand spanky new plasma cutter. Totally dead at this point.
I called Parker right on the spot and they had me pull the cover to look for the site of the explosion but all looked pretty normal. They gave me no hassles or runaround and said they would get a UPS return delivery label out right away, which they did.
I sent the machine out right after I got the label and they got it about 4 days later. They return shipped another unit the day after.
I got the new unit and noticed a couple things right off. This time all the case screws were tight and nothing was bent. The ground fitting and the gun fitting are not incredibley tight but I am reluctant to open the case and try to tighten them. I think they are servicable as is, but still, detail, detail, detail.
The regulator worked properly except this time the pressure gauge was in units unknown to me. It was not cfm/pressure but some other mumbo-jumbo. I'm sure in China it makes perfect sense, but it wasn't what I had the first time.
I put everything together without any hassles, fired up the machine, squeezed the trigger and got the most incredible nothing. Nada. No pops, no sizzles, no smoke, and most un-impressively no air either. Sooo, I called Parker right away and found out that his source had changed the pin-outs on the machine for some reason and that I need to move the trigger wires to two different pins in the plug. It was no big deal, requiring about 10 minutes of my time to do the soldering but still, detail, detail, detail. I also notified Parker of the other deficiences concerning the gauge and the non-crimped ferrule on the gun. He promised to send a proper (to us in the US) gauge, and I'm fairly certain if I hadn't fixed the crimping issue they would have replaced the gun as well.
All in all I'd say their customer service if you have a problem is better than average. On the other hand, Q/A on new machines before they go out the door needs some work. I always tell my people, it's not a screw up until it goes out the door screwed up. Till then it's just an error to be fixed.
Fired up the machine today with no problems. Plugged into 110/120 and set on about mid-scale it blew through 3/16" spring steel with no effort at all. I didn't have anything any thicker laying around the garage to work it any harder. When I get a chance I'll run it over to my weld shop, hook it up to some 220 and see what it can really do. For my "personal" use I'm betting it'll cut anything I'm liable to want cut.
The only thing that concerns me is durability given the issues to this point, but on the flipside, I think Parker will stand by his warranty. His after sale support to this point has been first rate.
I know there are some out there that are going to think/say "you get what you pay for when you buy that Chinese junk". I'm not going for that.
I paid $499 for this unit and if I had paid that for a made in the USA cutter I'd say yeah, I got what I paid for. A unit with a $499 price point is not going to buy you very much skilled labor here in the US but in CHINA, a $499 unit can be constructed with the same quality expectations you should get out of a $1,200 Miller unit here in the states.
Yeah, China is cheep labor. To us. In China that labor is not so cheap and should be expected to provide a quality product.
I'm no electronics expert, but from what I could see when I pulled the cover on the first unit, the guts looked like they were constructed well. Where the unit seems to fall down a bit is in the assembly. Detail, detail, detail."