Adapting Vulcan 63895 TIG Pedal to Lincoln 6-pin K-870 and What's Inside!

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Adapting Vulcan 63895 TIG Pedal to Lincoln 6-pin K-870 and What's Inside!

Backstory: I got a Lincoln Idealarc TIG 300/300 at an auction 6? months ago. It powered up and is beautiful inside and out. I'm pretty sure it is US Navy surplus. It did NOT come with the "common" Lincoln 6-pin K870 pedal. The 300/300 has been sitting patiently until I found one. The pedal plugs into the blue connector in front. After fees I paid about $440 for it. Meanwhile, I've sold items bought at that auction for a profit so the welder has become a freebie!

A K-870 pedal from Lincoln is around $400! SSC Controls in Ohio has a near identical unit for around $180. (refer to .pdf for a picture) The word on the street is that SSC supplies pedals for OEMs. I bought a pedal for a Miller Synch 300 from them about 15 years ago so they have been around. But I wasn't in a hurry to pay a chunk of money for a pedal only to find out the 300/300 doesn't weld...

Last week I came across the Vulcan (Harbor Freight) 63895 9-pin TIG pedal in the clearance aisle at my local HF. It was an "open box" return and like-new. Noting it hadn't been marked down in a while, I brought it to the manager's attention and he marked it down an additional 20%. They are supposed to mark down clearance items every 2wks so if you see something that has been sitting a while, don't be afraid to ask the manager for a discount. Anyhow, after tax I paid just about $49 for it. It has a 25' cord on it, BTW. Since it is a clearance item, I only had 5 days to return it.

While there is plenty of info on the K-870, there is/was NONE I could find on the 63895 aside from minor details in the ratings at the HF website. This very well may be the first "review" and disassembly with pinouts available to the public so if you find this info helpful, please click on the yellow "Donate" button above to help support this forum. Note the nearly useless HF diagram from one of their Vulcan TIG welders...

And don't be afraid to buy a SSC pedal as they are US-made quality. If I keep the 300/300 I may invest in their version of the K870. Their schematic/pinout for the K-870 is the .pdf below. The K-870 utilized a 10,000 ohm potentiometer (pot).

So with 5 days to return, I started taking the 63895 apart to see if it could be adapted to the 300/300. Three screws from the bottom showed an access panel to the spring. (continues below)