Hobart Trek 180 Cordless Welder
By Sean O'Hara
If you want to know how the welding supply industry is reacting to the cordless market, take a gander at the Trek 180 battery-powered MIG Welder. It’s awesomeness in a 52-lb. box.
We’re not saying this is meant to replace a larger shop model, and neither is Hobart. What the Trek 180 is designed to do is take care of small jobs when you are away from anything resembling civilization. The rig can run off its own 120 amp 17VDC battery or from an 115V power outlet with a 20 percent duty cycle.
It doesn’t sound like a lot until you are miles from nowhere with a busted-ass whatever you need to take care of on the spot. Then the little Trek 180 looks awfully powerful. Of course, this assumes you have a burning need to shell $1400 for this convenience. Then again we have met some off-road guys that would be all over this.
Trek 180 Cordless MIG Welder [Hobart]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
October 28th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
When wheeled i would have been all over this. Until i read this in the specs.
Weld Time On Battery 4 minutes at 120 A
Power Only 2 minutes at 180 A
It’s still a good welder. Good for a couple of tacs.
October 28th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
Looks like a pretty nice but limited piece of equipment.
As you say it will never replace a bigger rig - nor the versatility that you get with a truck-mounted engine-driven welder like the Miller Trailblazer that we use.
October 28th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
i belive that this welder can weld something in the ange of 100″ per charge but the duty cycle is 20% at full power
October 28th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Almost enough to tempt me as it’d be nice to have a welder I could bring with me when I go off-road, but for the price and the specs I think I’ll wait for the next generation and see what happens to the duty cycle/run time.
October 29th, 2009 at 9:28 am
Re:
Jim K. Says:
it’d be nice to have a welder I could bring with me when I go off-road,
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There are plenty of under hood welding systems with more robust specs.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=under+hood+welder