Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I've been welding for over 10 years. I love to weld, building projects from scratch is one of my favorite activities. Back in 2005, I bought a Lincoln 175HD that served me faithfully for 8 years. I loved that machine. It was simple, reliable and made some great welds (after enough practice). One of my best projects was a car rotisserie that was used to mount and rotate a 1993 GMC Suburban, among other things. Sadly, shortly before we moved to the US, I had to sell that welder. I figured I could just upgrade to something better in the near future. After all, welder technology has advanced significatnly since 2005. Fast forward to October 2015, and it's time to buy a new welder. I'm itching to get some projects started, and I've got a few in mind. So I spent a looooong time comparing many different models from different manufacturers. I sure was right about welder technology changing... all of a sudden there's relatively affordable multi-process welders available all over the place! Based on specs, price and reviews, I finally settled on this, the Forney 190 MP. So I receive the welder, set it up, try a couple welds, and then put it in the corner of my garage until I can find time to tackle my first project. Life happened, and I didn't get around to that project until January 2016. By that point, I was really itching to weld something. I had some quick car exhaust work to do, so out came the welder. I didn't have my 230v outlets installed yet, so I just plugged into a 25a 120v outlet. Exhaust systems don't typically need the higher output anyways. So I set up my piece, put on my welding hood and gloves, and pull the trigger... 3 seconds later, the welder stops functioning. The "overheat" light is blinking repeatedly. Fan is still going. Trigger refuses to respond. After about a minute, the overheat light stopped blinking and the welder was ready to go again. I figured maybe it was a fluke, so I started welding again. 2 seconds later, the welder stops and the overheat light starts blinking again... ?!? This continued the whole time, so I eventually spewed forth a bunch of expletives and gave up. I called up Forney customer service. They asked me to confirm all my welder's settings (everything was fine). The rep mentioned that the overheat light might come on if the feed mechanism is set too tight, so I adjusted everything to the point where the feed was practically slipping all the time and the spool was unwinding itself... still no good. The welder kept overheating after a couple seconds. It got to the point where it would overheat JUST FEEDING THE WIRE (no actual welding happening). The customer service rep suggested that maybe the fan had been installed backwards, and I should try turning it around. I figured "How hard can that be?", so I agreed to try that and hung up the phone. Turns out turning the fan around was a NIGHTMARE! It involves tearing apart the entire welder and yanking the mainboard out altogether. I ended up with a couple spare screws in the process. Oh well. In any case, it made no difference whatsoever. The welder was still overheating within a couple seconds of feeding the wire. I contacted customer service again (this time very annoyed), and they agreed to replace the unit. They sent me a brand new one at no charge, along with a return shipping label for the old one. When the new one arrived, I set it up and finished my welding job on the exhaust system. Everything seemed to work fine. I thanked Forney customer service and put the welder back in the corner of the garage again. Fast forward to 2 weeks ago, I FINALLY find time to work on a fun project (a custom gambrel for a friend of mine). So I pull out the welder, plug it into my new 230v outlet, set up my workpiece... and the welder runs for about 1/2 a second before overheating. Now I can't even get any welding done at all, just feeding the wire for less than a second causes it to flash the overheat light. IT'S DECEMBER IN VERMONT!!! IT'S 30f IN THE GARAGE!!! HOW CAN THIS THING POSSIBLY BE OVERHEATING?!? I ended up having to borrow a friend's welder to get this project done. I immediately contacted Forney Industries, but I never heard back. My support request appears to be completely ignored. It's supposed to have a 5 year warranty, but what use is a warranty if there's no service? So this brand new welder that I used exactly ONCE is now completely worthless. Don't waste your time on this junk. There's a good reason why it's so affordable. It's garbage. I regret ever laying eyes on it. Spend a couple hundred more on the Lincoln 210 MP instead. That's what I wish I'd done. By the way, these welders are made in China, right alongside the joke brands of welders like PRIMEWELD, Lotos and Migweld. I really hoped that the Forney name would impart some level of quality above those other brands, but clearly I was wrong. UPDATE 1/16/17: Contacted customer support via phone. Spent a LOT of time on the phone describing the problem to multiple people. Everyone was stumped. I was told the issue would be assigned to an engineer who would call me back. Never received a call back. This was WEEKS ago. Now I'll have to waste my time dealing with their horrific customer support AGAIN. THIS THING IS SUPPOSED TO BE UNDER WARRANTY!!! What kind of service is this?!? STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY'S WELDERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! UPDATE 1/24/19: Just wanted to confirm that I never got this resolved. Forney Industries failed me completely. I have a useless welder sitting in my garage (it looks pretty though). And I've wasted almost $1000. It's bright green, so I can't miss it. Constant reminder of what an awful, miserable company Forney Industries is. I hope they go bankrupt and disappear forever.