Bob, my welder uses 2- 110AH, Group 29 marine batteries, and one 200AH 6V floor sander battery. All from Walmart, all $90 to $100 each. The 3 chargers I use are automatic, 6/12 volt capable, 15A max chargers and I have a charge plug with 6 Anderson/Sermos type connectors so each battery is charged separately. They don't have to "match" that way; one of the 12V batteries is 3 years old, the others are new but obviously grossly mismatched in capacity. It gives me the flexibility to use what's on sale come replacement time. The galvanized steel strip resistor gives me the ability to adjust current; open circuit voltage is the battery series voltage. As the battery charge level lowers I just move the connector down one notch to compensate. A big 800uH toroidal choke acts as an arc stabilizer, which helps greatly at lower current levels where starting and maintaining an arc is otherwise a real stinker.
I don't use over 1/8" rods myself, and 3/32 is my most commonly used welding rod. For thinwall (1/16") tubing or sheet I use 1/16 inch rods and suffer with the greater difficulty in arc starting and stability of low amp welding. Below that, I must braze since I can't use MIG.
I'm only doing hobby work so battery capacity has not been an issue. The big deal for me is that I can tolerate using it pretty well outdoors with good ventilation, on a good day.
I found the ideal voltage by cutting up a retired Optima yellow top battery. What I found is that just one additional cell made 24V (+2v) way better for 3/32 rods. Two cells extra (24+2+2) was plenty hot enough for 1/8 rods. I couldn't find a source for 2V 100AH batteries in the US and China manufacturers wouldn't sell less than pallet loads, so I opted for adding a 6V battery and a big power resistor. The galvanized sheet/strip resistor on the side of the welder has worked out well- stays cool and has good increments of adjustment while dirt cheap. It saved me having to design, build and test a linear regulator for up to 160A and seems to work adequately. Arc starting at low currents would be better with an active regulator, and it would automatically compensate for battery fade but I like the utter simplicity of zero electronics.
A 160A adjustable current buck converter on 36V batteries would be perfect if one wasn't impaired by EMI. The battery interconnects and leads could be #4 AWG since a little loss is OK.
Mike, I'll be some generator will turn up to operate your nice inverter type stick welder if you just keep your eyes out for it. 7-10KW is a common capacity and might be useful as occasional shop power to supplement a CS for day to day operations.