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Argon in GTA

Gabe3366

New Member
Any recommendations for the best value argon in the GTA?

Airliquide leases a size 16 cylinder (110cf) for 120 a year plus ~100 refills.

A smaller shop in Scarborough I called sells a 80cf tank for 300 + 70 for refills.
 

Susquatch

Ultra Member
Administrator
Moderator
Premium Member
Any recommendations for the best value argon in the GTA?

Airliquide leases a size 16 cylinder (110cf) for 120 a year plus ~100 refills.

A smaller shop in Scarborough I called sells a 80cf tank for 300 + 70 for refills.

I think they all belong to the same outfit now. Messier.
 

Janger

(John)
Administrator
Vendor
Kms tools. Tanks are less and gas is less. Search the forum lots of discussion.
 

Janger

(John)
Administrator
Vendor
Air liquide , Praxair, oxy pro, all BS and a complete rip off. Makes my blood boil. Buy a tank for $300 at KMS and it’s good for ten years then needs a recert and it will still be good. Or lease for ever and in 10 years spend $1200 and about $30 more per refill.
 
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Tom O

Ultra Member
I bought one from Liquid Air you just go in and they give you a different one filled with the same gas or different gas.
 

Rauce

Ultra Member
Kms tools. Tanks are less and gas is less. Search the forum lots of discussion.
No KMS tools in the GTA.

I think they all belong to the same outfit now. Messier.
Nope, Air liquide, Praxair (Linde) and Messer are three different companies.

I used to lease a 110cf argon tank from Weldtech in Stoney creek, the lease was around $120/yr. They didn't re-fill leased cylinders, just swapped so it was super fast. I'm not aware of any places around here that will fill a customer owned cylinder >80cf, at least I couldn't find one.
 

SomeGuy

Hobbyist
Meh, TSC (Peavey Mart)'s Linde/Praxair 80cf's do the job for me. It's convenient, it's an "owned" tank, and just exchange whenever you need a new one including evenings/weekends.

Unless you're doing a metric boat load of welding, 80cf is around 4 hours of arc time, which is a LOT of welding. I don't see the appeal of going with bigger tanks if you have to lease them unless you're a production shop.
 

farmer888

Active Member
Any recommendations for the best value argon in the GTA?

Airliquide leases a size 16 cylinder (110cf) for 120 a year plus ~100 refills.

A smaller shop in Scarborough I called sells a 80cf tank for 300 + 70 for refills.
How much welding do you do? It angers me it's basically 2 companies run the whole thing. Messer and Air Liquide. Any smaller shop usually deals with the 2 big companies bottles.
My dad used to run a small weld shop and was with praxair, leased bottles but just cost of business. Now we have a small tank from tsc that you exchange out. And I got a 330 cf Argon from Weld tech in Hamilton on lease, Not sure what it is now but It was around $85 or $90 for lease and $160 ish for refill. I'd rather buy a 110 or 125 cf outright but no one sells them

I don't really do enough welding to justify it but nice having to not run for refills. I do a few small jobs here and there for friends and what not and I do charge a low rate just to help cover the cost but well under what a weld shop would charge.
The tsc tanks aren't cheap and the refills are very pricy. But if you don't weld that much I'd recommend buying the smaller tank at the Scarborough place. As long as they will stay in business. Sucks to get a cylinder that you can't exchange somewhere else
 

phaxtris

(Ryan)
Premium Member
Premium Member
Is there no Linde/Praxair in Ontario ? the Ontario guys seem to forget about the biggest and oldest supplier out there (linde)? Is it just not an option for you guys?
 

Bruce Rossiter

Active Member
Any recommendations for the best value argon in the GTA?

Airliquide leases a size 16 cylinder (110cf) for 120 a year plus ~100 refills.

A smaller shop in Scarborough I called sells a 80cf tank for 300 + 70 for refills.
I purchased a tank from this company in Scarborough and they were good to deal with.

I used to deal with Praxair on a rental basis but it got too costly so I decided to buy my own tank.
 

phaxtris

(Ryan)
Premium Member
Premium Member
This Messer thing must be an Ontario rumor, they hardly even have a presence in western Canada...i actually had to look them up, 10k employees, vs 64k for air liquide and 74k for linde, small fish, i dont think they are taking over any time soon
 

Susquatch

Ultra Member
Administrator
Moderator
Premium Member
This Messer thing must be an Ontario rumor, they hardly even have a presence in western Canada...i actually had to look them up, 10k employees, vs 64k for air liquide and 74k for linde, small fish, i dont think they are taking over any time soon

Actually, that's not quite the way I heard it. The version I heard was that ALL of them had been bought out by a Saudi company and all the business was gunna be rebranded to Messer. That's not the same as Messer buying out the rest.

That said, Messer is (was) a huge German outfit albeit small in Canada. According to this article, they did buy Linde back in 2019.


So who knows what is really going on. I won't be surprised at anything I hear on this subject.

No matter what happens, it won't likely be good news for us. Hence my hope that all the rumours are just rumours.
 
No we had all 4 where I live in the GTA, Linde bought Paxair but kept separate brands (fake competition), Messer bought Linde and is slowly removing both brands. Messer is big international, so don't let local stuff fool you.
 

Rauce

Ultra Member
Well, it's not what I heard but.... That's AWESOME! I like competition!
The industry is somewhat confusing because divisions in certain markets change hands often.

Messer was brought in to North America when Linde bought Praxair in order to create more competition.

Messer is the biggest privately owned industrial gas supplier but their market share globally is much smaller than Air Liquide and Linde.
 

Susquatch

Ultra Member
Administrator
Moderator
Premium Member
Ya, I'm totally confused already. I don't like big monopolies. I prefer competition.
 

architect

Super User
Canada Welding Supplies in Mississauga sells a tank for $250 and refills for $95. I couldn't find anything cheaper to buy outright a filled new tank.

My plan is to refill it elsewhere local for cheaper.

 

phaxtris

(Ryan)
Premium Member
Premium Member
Ive looked into it further, it looks like as a result of the linde/praxair merger, that parent company was forced to divest a bunch of assets, in canada, the states, etc, to prevent a monopoly

So yes, there are still 3 gas companies, Praxair, Air Liquide and Linde, all of them are big internationals, who is actually who I can't figure out

sounds to me like messer, the small fish was given probably a sweetheart deal

But shit that's one deep rabbit hole, the deeper you go the more confusing it gets


 
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