HI guys.
A little over a year ago I bought a new Lincoln Vantage 400 and I thought I might share my impressions of this machine with you. After a very slow year it now has only 475 hours on it – about half on steel fabrication and half on machinery repairs. I air arc with it quite a bit and half the time I use dual shield wire ( 1/16 and .045) and the other half the time I use stick.
Just so you know what I was using before I’ll tell you it was a Red D Arc machine – replica of a Lincoln 300 D and was made by Lincoln. I equipped it with a wire feed module so I could run wire in CV mode. I loved using this machine – very dependable. I considered it a very good stick machine and not bad with wire. A little underpowered for gouging with air arc.
So the Vantage 400, here we go.
It has lots of power, which makes it good for gouging, and it’s a great power generator.
Within the first 100 hours the muffler broke off – cracked right through the pipe that joins the muffler body to the exhaust flange. I welded it back together and put it back on. I had to make the same repair 3 times in the last year. The guys at the dealership say they’ve never had this problem before. They sent me a new muffler and in the box with it was a new support bracket which was quite a bit heavier than the original one. I’ve just replaced it and sent the old one back. Hope that’s the end of this problem.
A couple of days ago while servicing it I noticed one of the ac outlets was dead – GFI tripped. I pushed the reset button on it and the whole unit fell right into the panel. So I pressed the test button on the GFI unit and it did the same thing. Now I had two GFI units hanging from their wires behind the panel. Took things all apart and snipped the GFI units out and reconnected the outlets without them. The mounting flange on the units was just plastic and they’d simply vibrated apart. I phoned the dealership and they’d never heard of a problem like that but they ordered me some new ones and will ship them when they arrive there.
So I wasn’t too impressed with those things.
It took me some time to get comfortable welding stick with the Vantage. I runs a very smooth arc – really, that chopper technology seems to work. However I have a tendency to stick rods when out of position and I didn’t have that problem before. At first I turned the heat up but that wasn’t the answer. I couldn’t solve the problem with the arc control either. So, here’s how it settled out. All using 1/8 7018 rod: Flat – about 135 amps. Vertical or horizontal – somewhere between 125 to 130 amps. I don’t like the hot start so I always use the downhill pipe setting. I’ve had to become very careful in technique for it seems that the least little burr or bump reaches out and grabs the rod tip. Stuck! It’s way too easy to snuff the arc on this machine. I’m used to it now though and have produced some really good work with it. Some days though, while welding stick, I really miss my old 300 D.
As for wire, the Vantage is far superior to the old 300 D. It seems to love wire and I think that’s what this machine was really made for. Wish I could say it was perfect but I have a little here, too. While using .045 wire there is a tendency for the wire to fuse to the tip and stick there when the arc is first struck. I happens enough to be quite annoying and I’ll go through at least one tip per day – I used to go through a roll or two of wire per tip. I use an older LN25 wire feeder and have two of them – one for 1/16 and one for .045 (or whatever) Thinking it might be a wire feeder problem I switched them around but it didn’t make any difference. Tried all different settings , heats, speeds– no joy.
Overall, I think the Vantage is a better machine than my old 300D and I’m not sorry I bought it....yet. We’re still getting along and in a way it’s been good for me because I’ve sure had to sharpen up my technique.
The two little problems I’m having – sticky sticks and wire fusing to the tip could be just some stupid little thing I’m overlooking or never learned and I’d appreciate any helpful tips on the matter. Other observations and/or comments also welcome. Thanks for reading.
Tom
i have an sa-250 the muffler has broke off ten times i just fix it, now on my vantage 300 i had the same problem with gfi plugs its the plug manufacturer not lincoln i went to lowes and bought new ones and in ten minutes put them in. Other than that the vantage is an awesome machine in my opinion
By rcwelding 
Date 12-19-2010 14:37
Edited 12-19-2010 14:45
Sorry you are having problems... I like running mine in CC stick... I'm not too fond of the downhill pipe setting but I will use it from time to time..
I went from running a Miller Bobcat 250 to my Vantage 400 so I thought I had died and gone to heaven when I started welding with it...
I haven't had any problem with sticking so far...
RC
Never had a quality issue with mine. Arc starts suck on downhill mode. Oil changes take forever. It's my back up machine to my 69 Redface.
Solution for the Oil Change Speed. I had the same problem .............UNTIL, I was told this trick. I am not a Mechanic so it was something I would have never thought of. When you open the valve on the drain hose it is very slow. Reach up and unscrew the cap on top of the valve cover. Empties the oil in about 1 1/2 minutes
I'll try that. My biggest problem is putting the new oil in that piss poor design of an oil fill. I thought to cut a hole in the top cover to access the top oil fill but wasn't sure there would be a problem with that. Does the 500 have that same slow oil fill problem?
Although I have an Oil Fill cap on the Valve cover. I have another fill cap on the Side. It is easy to get to
The side or bottom fill is easy to get to but it takes like half an hour to 40 minutes just to get the new oil in. It will only take very small amount at a time or it spills over. The 400 has an oil fill cap on the V/C also but no means to get to it so I thought I could take like a three inch hole saw and cut a hole and seal it with a cap.
flexible clear hose and funnel. that is what i use at work for hard to get to oil fill spots. sometimes we hard pipe to an easier spot.
Hey Scrappy, it's not hard to get to it just won't take oil.
Pull the dip stick out when you add oil
Is the oil You are adding warm enough to flow easily?
Hey Dave, it doesn't matter, 10/30 or 15/40 it won't go but a little bit at a time. I'm pretty sure I tried pulling the D/S and the oil fill on the V/C.
My ranger was the same way more or less and have run into that when doing oil changes on equipment years ago. Loosen the cap on the valve cover and it allows the pressure, atmospheric(?) equalize? Otherwise you have the classic coke bottle effect, turn it upside down and it gurgle, gurgle....gurgles, poke a hole in the bottom of the bottle and it eliminates the vacuum created by the liquid flowing out the bottom. Seems like the Duetz engines and Takeuchi machines would do this more than most with the oil drain set up with the on/off switch type of rig on the oil drain. Most of the stuff I did this trick would work, sometimes though, it would just dribble out, little by little. That's when I'd walk back to the truck, crank up the heat or a/c and listen to the radio and smoke a few.
Pulling the dip stick always seemed to help the draining part for me... Didn't do much for the filling part though..
RC
Great review. The goods and the bads.
