Got the Hobart out of the box at last and started work on Franken-cart to keep it on.  It’s going so well, I may just buy a cart.  
 

I’ve never MIG welded before with steel wire & argon/co2.  I had an electric welder previously from Harbor Freight and weld with flux wire.  That POS always popped a 20amp fuse after a few minutes of continuous use.  I also have gas welded a bit before, but this MIGging is new to me. 
 

I started off practicing on an old cookie sheet.  I must have had the voltage up too high because all I did was burn holes through it.  
 

So, I just started on the cart instead.   First things first: cut & bend.   I think I need to get a metal chop saw.  Cutting angle iron on the floor with handheld grinder/cutter is an imprecise and error-prone PITA.  Why did I take the gloves off here is a mystery to me, but I was promptly rewarded for my safety error (pic).  The resulting cuts weren’t 45s and when I bent for the first corner, the gaps was too wide to weld.   So put the cut chunk on top and welded that.   
 

The results were FUH-ugly, but it’s SQUARE! (Pic).  Now, I have essential tremor and my welds are never perfect, but this is bad even for me.  There was lots of popping as I welded.  Not sure I have everything set just right:

0.23 steel wire & tip

gas at 20CFM*

Voltage at 30

wire speed on 1

(any suggestions here?)

No further updates from RR on my 02.  Bill had some delay with his tow vehicle. Hope to get pics from him as soon as it’s back in the shop and being prepped for reinstall of engine/trans/etc. 

Thats all the news there is for now.  
 

* - I think.   20CFM is what it snaps down to when I pull the trigger anyway