Metal super market, walk in take a hard right and spend $20 on a shit ton of scrap shorts they have in the rack. sheet 16ga, 22ga, 1/16, 1/8, 3/16, 1/4, 3/8. 1/2… Mild steel, Aluminum, Stainless, tubing pieces, angle iron, square… lots of shit to get on the cheap and spend a day welding it all up and practicing. Butt welds, lap welds, fellet’s, verticle, overhead… they are all very different.
just about anyone can pick up a mig and make metal stick. How well it stays together, or looks (good looking welds arnt allways strong) comes with time.
If you want to learn, dont cheap out on a harbor freight shit box becasue its cheap. They are actually hard to make work right… Lack of consistant power, wire speed doesnt adjust well, wire speed might get faster or slower, or jitter… just frustraites you and will bumm you out when your welds look like shit.
CL, look for a small miller, hobart (cheaper version of a miller), lincoln… flux core sucks forget it. $300 will get you a good used mig that will teach you alot.
I have a small FAQ list in my head, we taught a female friend of ours how to weld… she never touched one befor. in 2 days she got the hang of it and actually laid some mig welds on my brothers ranger build!
i built my jeep bumper with supermarket metal, the only expensive part was the 60$ 5’ piece of 2X4 the rest was made from the extra foot of the piece i didnt need and scraps from the drop shelf