Thread: Welding Gas

What size bottle? If you don't use it a lot, maybe the disposable bottles are the way to go.

Hi

Quite a while ago (5yr) I was paying $89/year cylinder rent and about 60 to refill... stuff that! bottle would last me about 2 years. I've now swapped to gasless for all my steal work - it's just as neat however I would use gas for something like building a trailer (gas weld is technically stronger but for the average handy job it doesn't matter) and the cylinder can be rented short term. The gasless wire is about 3 times the price but over two years I'm miles ahead.
When I do aluminium or stainless (different gas) I do a deal with the brother in-law, I borrow it for the couple of weeks and give him the amount it cost to refill (I usually use about 1/4 of bottle) so it works for both of us.

Hi, same here. For 95% of the welding I do I use a gasless mig - maybe a little more slpatter and not quite as pretty a weld, but way cheaper. For TIG or Oxy I go next door. Cheers, Erich.

I am paying round figures AU$140pa rental for a cylinder, and a refill of Argoshield is now somewhere over $70. I am going to hand in this current cylinder when I finish the job I am doing as I will only need the Mig ad hoc from now on. I will be buying disposable cylinders from Repco. l resent being forced to pay cylinder rental when in other countries you can own cylinders and in Oz years ago you could also. My father owned his cylinders before the rules changed and a good way to stand his hair up was to mention CIG/BOC and cylinder rental.

Rent is still the killer.

We buy in bulk, Corgon, Oxy, Acetylene, LPG, Carbon dioxide (post mix gas), Beer gas and helium so my price will not be the norm but I will check tomorrow and post it up.

You can from BOC hire E size Argon, Argo sheild or O/A bottles at a weekend rate which is a bit more expensive than the normal hire rate but your not paying it all the time so it works out fairly cheap.

You just pay for your gas used and the weekend rent.

Great to see what a monopoly on supply does…. Force everyone to rent then rental price goes through the roof and people are pushed to disposable items – that’s great for the environment.

You dont have to be supplied by BOC, its your own call. We do chose BOC for all of our gas though, and we dont pay full price for anything. The more you deal with them the cheaper they get.

In late 1989 I took out a 10 year lease on some Oxy-Acetylene bottles from Air Liquide. Two months later I got posted to Norfolk Island so I had to hand the bottles back. Three years later when I returned from Norfolk I found the bottle costs had skyrocketed.

I gave up on using Oxy then and haven't used my gear since.