Alrighty so we only have two more nights in this class, and it's all done with . Tuesday night we are going to be tacking the final project together, and Thursday will be the final. I really can't say enough about how great this class has been. I am really glad I was able to get in, because It gave me a whole new level of appreciation for TIG, and really opened my eyes to the quality welds that can be made using it.

I was able to speak to the lady in charge of the program tonight, and got straight exactly what the degree options are. There are in fact 3 levels to it. The basic certificate, that only requires you to do the introduction classes, The Welding Fundamentals which covers a lot more and what I thought was the highest certificate/degree and the one I'm only a few credits from completing and the last one, Welding Technology associate degree.

The classes that I have remaining are required for both the higher level certificates, but if I take two extra classes, I will graduate with an associates degree instead of just a certificate. So with the scholarship I'll only have to pay for one extra class next spring, and for me it's pretty much a no brainer. I may have to take a math class, because I don't think the one I took my first time going to college is going to count towards it, so as of now I should have 5 classes remaining after the ones I'm doing. Mettalurgy, Heat Treatment, Flux Core, Team building (bullshit class that is 3 credits and everyone I know in it, thinks its a joke) and the math class (assuming I have to take it).

And on a interesting turn of events, I was talking to the younger instructor whose teaching the intro class and noticed the logo on his shirt. Its a company that my old Scoutmaster owns, which makes something to do with targeting systems/ guidance systems for the Gatling guns used by the Navy. I have known this guy for almost 20 years now and had no clue they used welders, and in particular Tig welders. I am definitely going to find out some more about it, as the company is not far from me at all and I imagine pays pretty well. Plus it would be a really fucking cool thing to know that I'm doing something that matters.

Anywho here's what I did tonight. The coloration is much more vivid, but after doing the water test it dulls it so they don't look as rainbowish.

First up is a side project my teacher let me and a couple people do. My buddy had the idea to make a mug, and our teacher happened to have the bottom plates that fit perfectly. I got one that was bigger then the others, so I had to weld it differently on the bottom then the other guys but it came out pretty good. Still trying to decide how I want to do the handle.










Next up is this. Not really sure how to describe it, other then a slanted pipe. As with my mug, I added filler but worked on controlling the amount better and not adding so much. The thing with this and the last project I did last Thursday is the base plate is thicker, which forces you to increase amperage to build the puddle correctly, but you also have to increase your speed because the pipe is thinner, and will melt faster.












Little peak at the lab, I had to take some pics for my scholarship and figured you guys would like to see them too. There are a ton more booths behind where this shot was taken, but it shows the tig booths. Mine is obstructed by the column.


And this was the final project for the introduction to welding class that was going on, on the other side of the lab. From what I understand each person made a part, and then they took turns welding it together. (Much cooler then my into classes final project haha)

I feel like we hit a milestone boys. 4 pages and 4,000 views . I really hope everyone is enjoying this thread as much as I have been enjoying my classes.

So tonight was the last night for this week, and I was able to move on to 6G when we start back on Monday, so I was pretty stoked on that. I had a much easier time with 5G then I did on 2G.

I'm also going to share a bit of "drama" because I think it goes to really driving home my point about putting forth the effort when you take classes like these (or anything in life). The same guy who I mentioned earlier who didn't know what 6010's were, and said "I just want a good grade" has carved out a pretty piss poor reputation for himself with both instructors and fellow students. So our teacher has very few rules in this class, and they are not hard to follow. You weld until 8:30, you clean up your booth, you tell him before leaving and you give it your best effort, and show up to class.

This guy just started horizontal pipe last week, and spends roughly 70% of his time wandering around. I was in the booth next to him on Monday and watched it first hand. He would weld about 5 inches, and then walk away and wander around for a while. But what really irritates everyone is he keeps taking the fucking tools we all share, and refuses to clean up not only his booth but the common areas. You go to use the table vice to grind a land, and low and behold the fucking grinder is gone. You go to get the compressed air grinding attachment to feather your tacks, and its gone. He seems like he's oblivious to common courtesy and what really got me pissed tonight, was while I was grinding my hotpass out, he walks up behind me and unplugs the grinder while I'm using it to ask me if we could leave at 8... Like I fucking control what time we leave.

Then he leaves at 8 on the dot without saying anything for the umpteenth time and left his booth dirty, his work in the stand and his welder on. And because of that, we all got to clean his shit up, sweep his booth before we got to leave.

Now I share this for several reasons:

First because if anyone is interested in taking some classes, it's important to understand that cleaning up your work area is paramount. Cleaning is actually part of the grade, and not only that it's just common sense to clean up your shit before you leave. If you fail to do it, your fellow classmates will have to do it for you and for all of us, that causes us to resent you for basically telling us your time is worth more then ours.

Second because when you do shit like leave early, dick around and refuse to do assignments you will develop a reputation with teachers. When you get out there and start applying for jobs, you want to be able to use them as references and no one is going to vouch for someone who is lazy and incompetent.

And lastly you want to have a good reputation with your class and fellow students. No one likes having to look for tools the school provides because you are too cheap to buy your own 20 buck harbor freight grinder. Everyone needs help at somepoint, and you want to be able to ask fellow students for tips or advice or even borrow something but no one is going to be interested in helping out a douchebag.

Anyways my rant is over. I don't know why but this dude has really stuck in my craw tonight.

Here's what I got. This is the root laid in, and grinded down to get it ready for the hotpass.


This is obviously the root pass. I really worked to feather my restarts and burn in my tacks so there were no pinholes or lack of fusion.


Cover pass




Some more root pass shots



And because I had to help clean up his booth, I took a few pics of the dude I mentioneds progress. Normally I don't like to call anyone out, because we all have bad night's and my first 2G didn't look great either. But the thing you have to remember is this is an advanced class. By this point there have been 4 classes on stick welding. 3 classes dealing with just stick welding, 2 classes where groove welding was focused on specifically and 1 class where plates were all out of position (2G, 3G etc) and welded open root and inspected by a welding inspector.

That guy should probably pursue a different career.  It's one of those skills where the basic concepts are pretty easy to grasp, and looks pretty easy when you see the experts do it on Youtube, but some folks never seem to master the whole eye-hand coordination thing in real life.

I have a gob of crap to do today and was getting coffee in me...then I found this thread.

Two hours of binge reading and now I can get started with my day.

There just aren't enough good words to give the OP. Not only for your drive and attention to detail, but the effort to document progress in learning.

Keep it up man, you will go far.

Tag for further reading.

Congrats on the scholarship. I've started learning to weld with an intro class this summer. I'm glad I don't have anyone in my class like you have in yours. Yikes.

I agree. For the most part I try not to call anyone out whose work isn't the best because I have been there, and had some stuff turn out looking like dogshit but this guy really has no business doing this. And it's not even because his weld's don't look perfect, it's because he doesn't care enough to put in the work to get them better.

Haha thanks man. I have really tried to be honest with my work and not only show the good, but to also include the bad. I put off going back to school for years, way longer then I should have because there was a fear of the unknown and failing at it. I had absolutely no clue what to expect out of welding, and I wanted to give honest insight into what to expect for anyone considering it. I really hope that anyone considering learning the trade would look at this and say that they too can learn it, and what to expect when they do. I really hope that this journey has helped some folks who were on the fence like I was, because I am so glad I finally decided to do it.

Thanks so much man! I hope you enjoyed the intro class

I know a lot of folks may not be interested in making a career out of welding, but if you want to learn some of the basic's for projects at home,  the intro classes are a great way to dip your toe in and learn a lot of good fundamentals. And for the couple hundred buck's it costs, you learn enough that your home projects will hold up better, and look better most importantly you'll know how to do it safely.

I want to say this though, 90% of my fellow student's at this level are great folks who work hard and try their best and I get along with all of them. A lot of the guys I have had classes with have been ex-military and they work their asses off in class and it shows in their work. I have even had several women in my classes, who worked really hard to prove that they have a place in the program too, and they are fantastic welders. Even my Asian buddy who can barely speak English work's relentlessly to get the projects done, and done right.

The biggest thing I have noticed is the people who are in either their mid 20's or older, work really hard to learn this and they do well. Younger guys and girls can be really hit or miss. Some like my friend in the advanced Tig class can make great welds, work hard and do very well overall. And unfortunately the other half use financial aid money to pay for class, and have absolutely no interest in doing anything more then the absolute minimum for class. They show up late and stoned, they leave the second they can without getting in trouble, and they spend half their time outside smoking or goofing off. They don't have to worry about rent or providing for a family, so they don't really care much about doing anything other then the bare minimum because as long as they pass, who cares.

What they fail to realize is this is the easy part. Going out into the work force is going to be a rude awakening for them. They also have this notion that just because the industry is desperate for welders, they are all going to make 6 figures and work a 9-5, 40 hour week job in an air conditioned environment. The reality is that they keep doing the bare minimum and they are going to be paid the bare minimum and frankly they won't have any job security either.

I realized early on that I want to make as much money as possible, and I don't want to get stuck in some shitty job where the pay is barely more then a fast food restaurant and I get laid off every time the work get's low. And to do that, I have to be the best welder I can possibly be. If I learn a niche job like welding thin metals or stuff like aluminum, and not only that but I do it well, then I have job security and can get a salary that reflects my skills.

Your thread is nothing short of inspirational and humbling.

One of the things you said about all the effort you are putting reminds me of what a teacher of mine used to say, the goals you set are the goals you get.

I can related to that completely: my current job was but my second option, the fallback plan. Since then I found out that the place I wanted to work at (option 1) sucked in many levels and, more importantly (2) a lot of people want to work where I work at now, and that includes pretty much everyone I would work with at the job I was turned down. I found out they have the budget to get 3x their current staff either, but they don't. So, to get in you have to be more than pretty good. Just doing what you are told and going home does not cut it either.

I can therefore relate to you refusing to do just good enough. I hope when you graduate you will soon find a job that will appreciate your skills, and show their appreciation in your paycheck. If not, keep building your name and then go look for the place that does. After all the sweat equity you are putting in, do no settle for a good enough job.

I've enjoyed reading your posts.  I went through the Hobart welding program in Troy, OH back in the early 80s.  Not two weeks after finishing my training I was in Houston welding on fracking rigs.  However, life threw me a curve ball and I ended up working for Uncle Sam.  When I retired from fed.gov at 50, I moved to AZ and got so bored with retirement I took a job as a welding instructor for the local community college.  I taught AWS D1.1 code for 5 years.  So I can relate to your thread both as a student and instructor.

My advice to you is to join the United Association (UA) which is the trade union for welders and pipe fitters.  They have locals all over the country.  The  hard part to swallow is that you will essentially have to "start over" with their apprenticeship program.  However, it's not easy to get in to the UA so if you have certs, you are better positioned to get selected.  At any rate, good luck with your new career.

One moar piece of advice - welding is a trade for the young.  Eventually, it will take a physical toll.  You seem like a motivated young man.  Get your certs, go work in the field for a few years and then pursue a CWI.  Inspecting welds pays better and its much easier on your body.  But get your time in under the hood, then pursue the CWI.

I am turning 29 in a month, and I can already attest to the damage working in construction and concrete work have already done. It's funny you mention the CWI aspect, because since I started the program I kept saying ya I'm gonna be a welding instructor.. Then I realized after being in the program for a while exactly what that means.

I'm hoping right now to get my degree, spend some time working in the field, and pursue CWI through the AWS program. I got an email about it a few days ago and checked it out.

I may end up with a union eventually, but right now I am hoping I'll be able to find somewhere local and get my foot in the door and decide what to do after I get a feel for what its like.

Thanks for the advice though, its nice to hear from some folks that have been where I'm at

Alrighty guys, doing a bit of catch-up with my pictures here. Tonight in my Tig class, we did prep for our final which didn't take a ton of time so I also worked a bit on my personal project.

I'll grab some pics of that Sunday but basically I had two sections of pipe. I needed one that was about 6 1/2 feet tall and had two 4 foot sections. One was galvanized and the other was steel, but because I am trying to do this project for as cheap as possible, and these were free I wasn't going to really worry about it. It is 2 3/4in pipe, and I welded it open root and got it as straight as I could considering I had to get my teacher to help hold it up for me. Good news is I was also able to get further along on the plates for the same project, as I took them in to weld up because two were smaller then I needed and while I was there I used the plasma cutter to save myself hours of using the grinder. Really looking forward to unveiling this project, and I plan on releasing the blueprints I made so that anyone who wants to, can make their own.

Another funny note, the same guy I mentioned before, "chief" just keeps on making an ass of himself. Punishment for leaving without saying anything, and not cleaning your booth is you have to grind all the tables. As soon as he walked into class, our teacher told him that he left his booth a mess, and has to grind tables.

First he never ground any tables, and yet again took the classes grinder to his booth (He was also no where to be found so I just reclaimed it). Then a buddy and I were cleaning up the general area and I spotted it. As my buddy calls him "chief", left his booth a fucking mess, his pipe in the stand again. Our teacher just stared blankly for a minute in disbelief. I think at this point, chief is going to fail the class without a doubt lol.

Here's the pics I got.  

6G root going in.



After looking at this pic, It looks like I had one restart fail to fuse




Cover pass. Still working on getting it uniform but its better then I was expecting.


Here is what we did tonight. We could only tack it, no welding until Thursday.

You have a knowledge base in metallurgy now.

An introductory course in machining would be worth some consideration.

Even if you don't do much with it, having the process knowledge will help you get into a different arena.

I worked with some other millwrights that came in from a welding background.

I actually was considering a career in machining, but after looking at the math requirements I decided to go with welding. I have always had a hard time with math, and when I was looking at a machinist buddy's homework, I realized I would have a very difficult path and would probably not do very well.

I may end up pursing some robotic welding classes down the line however.

So tonight was my last night in Advanced Tig. I am actually a bit sad to see it end as it was by far the most enjoyable class I have had so far. Everyone in this class have been all been standup folks and everyone put forth their best efforts. I was talking to my teacher afterwards and learned just how much time and effort goes into this class. He has come up with every single project and then sourced the metals for it, and gotten up a hour early every day before work for five weeks to cut it all. Like I mentioned before, he has a regular day job welding and teaches at night.

Its instructors like that, who are willing to go the extra mile that help us students be the best welders we can be. I can't speak highly enough of the folks like this who teach, because they have a real passion for the trade and are willing to pass that knowledge onto us. He also paid out of pocket for us all to have pizza tonight, which is always great way to end a semester.

I got my final grade tonight, and finished out with an A. My buddy and I were the only two who got an A, but from what he told us all no one got anything below a D.

I have a ton of pics tonight. The coloration was good on pretty much all of it, but it dulls out when I water test for whatever reason. Some welds were better then others, but it passed the water test just fine and I like it. We also had to use filler on all welds, so fusion welding was not an option. (It also kinda looks like one of those WW1 mortar shells lol)

First weld of the night.








Moved up to keep my heat controlled




I forgot to take pics of the rest of the progress, but I then went up and did the but weld at the top and then went to the bottom and welded that, and then the middle. All in position. My hand was really shaky tonight for some reason so my butt welds at the top were not as nice as I wanted but it happens.






The underside


And this is it, completed and ready to be toasted with.


Here's some random pics of other peoples projects that they decided not to keep.

First up is one of the women in my classes work. (She stole my beautiful initials design from one of my first projects haha.)


This is last weeks project. No clue whose it is


No clue whose this one is, but they went a little crazy with the filler metals and dollars to doughnuts it leaked lol



No sure who made this one, but its not terrible


This one was one of the two women in my classes work. She did make a pretty good looking final project, but she struggled all semester with getting a good fitup. Without a good fitup, the thin metal melts really fast and she had a hard time filling in the erosion.



This one, well this one is just bad. I try not to be critical to much because I know not all my projects look great but this is just terrible looking. The fillet at the bottom almost looks like it was welded with a mig gun. Not only that but there is a considerable amount of undercut and quite a few holes in it.


This was someones matchbook holder. These were really difficult so I won't criticize this, because mine did not look the way I wanted either



Another one that someone did that looks really bad. No clue on whose it is


I think this was my buddys, but I am not entirely sure



I can't remember if this was another angle of the lady in my classes one or not


I think this is my Asian buddy's project, but I'm not sure because his name was really hard to pronounce. Great guy, and a very hard worker. Hes exactly the kind of legal immigrant that you want. When we switched to 1/16th tungsten I wasn't able to make it to Airgas before they closed, and told the teacher I didn't have any yet. Before I could even finish saying that, he was reaching in his bag and grabbing his tungsten and handing me half of his box. I really hope he finds a good job tig welding. (he currently works at a place that does nothing but Mig)



I also found out what to expect for my final in Advanced Pipe. We are going to weld our pipe coupons in whatever position we are currently working on, and then do a bend test (root face and cover). I'm not sure if we are going to do 4 coupons or just 2, but I'm hopeful that I'll be able to pass that. And here are the pictures from Wednesdays class.

This is my 6G, I didn't have much time to take a ton of pics, but heres what I did get. This is one of the two pipe sections I am working on, the other one was cooling when I took these and has about 3 completed sections on it. I am still not completely happy with my cover passes, and the root had 2 spots on it that irritated me. I had a problem with not penetrating through my tacks, so I really started pushing them when I would get to them. I pushed too hard and got a little blob on the inside that was higher then the rest in the two upper tacks. I think on Monday I'm going to make a slightly longer tack, and really feather it down so I won't feel like I have to stab it to get it fused.

This is the hot pass going in. The second pic is at an angle, so it doesn't look like its 6G but it is.



First cover pass


I was super pissed when I realized I had made a "wave" in my line.


I used a 1/8th rod for the bottom fill pass, just because I had run out of 3/32. I ended up getting some from a classmate though

Just an update tonight, I forgot my phone so I don't have any pics.

I'm a bit irritated at myself because I blew my test on the cover pass. We could do one practice one and the test and of course, my practice one was textbook. Root was fused all the way through, the coverpass was in correctly and looked beautiful for once, and then I weld my test up.

A point of disagreement with my teacher is use of a grinder. Now I understand the pros of not using one, and it saves a lot of time. But not being able to grind out the root for the hotpass is a first. We also couldn't grind out restarts which is usually something you do, but I am not bad at restarting without it, but in every practice pipe we have done, it was standard to grind the root for the hotpass.

Even so I was able to lay a pretty decent root in, but the coverpass was higher then normal because of not being able to grind the root and fusion with the plate on the cover was a lot harder, and it did not go as well.

I passed the root bend with flying colors. The face bend however did not go so well. It had a pretty defined lack of fusion on one side and tore along that line.

But I can go back in Wednesday and try one last time. The young guy who was an ex- Marine did 6G as well, kicked ass and had some flawless bends. Hes definitely going to be making some good money. I was the only other one to do 6G, and I think everyone else pussed out and tested on 2G.

Either way, I am confidant that I can get it down on Wednesday but wish me luck anyways.

Best of luck on Wednesday. I've been struggling the last couple weeks. I received my last two assignments back today and I received a 95% on both of them, however they took me a long time to crank out. I'll be headed in on Wednesday hoping for some redemption on my 6011 vertical up welding.

Awesome man, I wish you the best of luck as well!

One thing that made a world of difference for me with open root, is finding the land and gap and amperage range that work for me. Personally I like a 3/32 landing and a 3/32 gap because it allows me to weld a bit colder, and a bit slower.

And I'm sure you probably already know all this, but for those who are wondering what I'm talking about, I drew up a few MS paint diagrams since I didn't have any pics for tonight.

When I started on open root, I had a really hard time keeping my keyhole in the center and what I didn't understand was, what you do to one side, you must also do to the other.

My other problem was heat control, and knowing when I need to pull off and let it cool down. Especially when going vertically, the heat rises and you have to speed up or you end up with a monster keyhole. In the below example of my own weld, you'll see how large the keyhole got. When it started getting to about about 1/8th I should have pulled out and let it cool down. The other mistake I made was starting on the side that was the tightest. By starting on the tight side and welding up to the larger gap side, I was only making it worse as hot metal expands.
Attached File


Notice how as I went up, my weld gets bigger and bigger? Well that goes into the gap widening. Because I did not turn my amperage down, I was burning the sides out, making the keyhole bigger and depositing more and more metal while not really gaining any ground. When the gap starts getting too big, whip slightly farther ahead to give that fraction of a second it takes to cool the weld pool down some. If that's still not helping, pull off it and let it cool for a few minutes and restart slightly colder.


Another problem I was having was my restarts and my tacks. I was not burning my tacks in and my restarts were not fusing. As you will see in these examples, you want to start a bit back from the keyhole and warm the electrode up and the root up at the same time. So that by the time you get to the keyhole its really cooking and it burns in. The same with tacks, you want it nice and hot as you get to the tack, push the electrode in and continue the same speed.
Attached File


This is Chiefs horizontal pipe. His root isn't terrible, but you can clearly see where his tack was, because its the one spot he failed to fuse it, most likely because he was moving to quickly over it, and not pushing it into the existing metal/tack
Attached File


I fixed my problem with uneven lands and gaps by doing this. I will take two 7018, 3/32 electrodes knock the flux off and bend them into a V. I also use the diameter of the electrode, to check my land. If you want a 3/32 you lay it on the landing, and if no metal shows on the bottom, you are at the landing you want. If you ground down more than that, you know that your landing is closer to a 1/8th. The only problem I had was once you tack it, the metal shrinks and the gap was still slightly larger on the other side. So I started doing this and my gap was the exact same all around:
Attached File



And lastly, the thing that probably took me the longest to get right was electrode angle. This is my personal preference, and it is possible to drag a 6010 but you have to have a certain gap and move quickly. For me the whipping with a side to side weave, works best. One thing that was a really fucking me up was my electrode angle. When I was doing 2G (horizontal) I kept trying to drag it instead of pushing it. And for me that was causing the puddle to stay super heated, and was depositing a ton of weld into the puddle. Once I realized I had to push it just like I did on vertical, I finally started laying my roots in decently.

Attached File

And this is a handout that I was given in one of my very first classes. I didn't pay it much attention at first, but its something my favorite teacher has stressed in every class and its actually really important.

It doesn't matter what process you use, if you are having ANY problems welding you can always narrow it down by going through these 5 essentials.

Attached File

Attached File

Well guys final night of welding for a bit tonight. I'm going to post a bit more about the future after this post, so keep reading.

So tonight I tried a final time on my pipe test. I chose 6G again.

Those of us who came tonight were also treated to pizza which was really nice of our teacher to buy for us. When I had this particular teacher the first time in my 124 class, I honestly thought he was kind of a hardass who just liked to fuck with us. He always wanted us to weld as fast as possible, would give us a hard time for using a grinder and when you ask is this good? He would always say "weld another one". But after having him again in this class I realize why he pushed us so hard. By making us weld until we had no flaws and then weld another, we learned how to have high output with a higher level of passing welds. And by learning not to rely on a grinder we paid more attention to detail and from what I understand we won't look like unskilled welders when we get jobs in the field. He's actually become my second favorite teacher because of it. When you pass his class with a high grade, you know you earned it.

And before the few pics I got, I'll share some funny/irritating stories from class the past two nights.

So the girl in our class, who is probably one of the nicest people I have met busted on her pipe bend. She did 2G and had been doing great all semester and really worked hard at getting pipe welding down, so she was pretty crushed when her root bend literally broke in half. She was able to weld another one tonight (she bent the one she did Monday tonight) and on her second attempt, she was able to pass her bend with only minor flaws.

Chief was hilarious as usual. Honestly I am just baffled by this guy and what he really wants to get out of the program. For some reason he always asks me for help or when he has questions on stuff, and I think its because our teacher rode his ass like a rented donkey. But anyways he asked me to come over and look at his weld a couple nights ago, and he had just been moved up to 5G. He wanted to know what settings I used, and I again tried to explain that it's not universal and depends on his gap, his speed and so on. His first mistake was welding downhill. He started his root at the top and welded down. He did the same with his cap, and thats a big no no in our class. Our teacher refuses to accept any 7018 welds made downhill. (You can weld downhill but I think you are only supposed to do it with the pipeliner electrodes). On top of that, he had done a really bad fitup and had about a 1/16th lip all the way around his pipe which was visible even with his root in. I honestly tried to give him some pointers, and showed him the electrode angles and how I put my roots in, but what he said next just shocked me. I tell him to start at the bottom, and weld up and then tell him to get down on his knees and get under it so you can see the weld good and he says "if I ever pipe weld again I'll bring a towel to put down on the floor"... I mean what do you even say to that? If your worried about getting dirt on your knees then you better start learning to code or something.

So Monday it comes time for testing and he goes back to 2G. He welded it up and got his two sections to cut out with the plasma cutter. I was using the plasma cutter when he came up and after I cut mine on he asks me "what do the R and F mean". I explain it stands for "root and face". He looks at me and goes ya but what does the "R and F" stand for... I'm sure I had a priceless look on my face, and I again explain it stands for root and face. When he asked a 3rd time I was starting to loose my cool. I SHOW him the root, and the cover and explain it for a 3rd and final time. He then asked a 4th time and I started to get heated and wondered if he was fucking with me, but the look on his face told me that he was dead serious and it was just not sinking in. I finally tell him to ask the teacher and walked away.

He is bending it tonight and asks for help and again, I am trying not to be a dick, so I show him how set up his straps, where to weld it and give him some advice on grinding it as that was what fucked me up Monday. He says he's never done any of this and after welding his tabs on brings it over again to ask if he did it right. I tell him to weld both sides and to grind it with the contour of the pipe and then buff it with the flapper disk. He then asks me what a flapper disk is so I go and show him the difference in the grinding wheels. I told him several times not to grind it down a ton because it actually hurts your chances of getting a good bend. Well because there were so many imperfections in it, he ground it down to about 3/8ths

He bends it while we are all taking a pizza break, and boy did it go exactly as I expected. On his root it tore pretty bad. When he bent the face, he bent it off center and it bent in about the weirdest shape I have seen yet. It still tore somehow even though it was way off center. Our teacher asks him what he wants to do. Take the grade as is, or weld another one because there is still plenty of time left. He asks what his grade would be as is, and is told he would get a "D". He took his grade, and then asked if he could take a pizza home.....

Honestly he either has a learning disability or has the IQ of a block of lead.

My other two buddy's both passed their 2G bends, and I think everyone who tested passed. Everyone but the ex-Marine and I did 2G.

Mine went better, but not as perfect as I would have liked. It was solid but didn't look as good as I had hoped it would. I asked what I had got for a grade, and he said I got an A on my bend, and should have an A in the class. We were graded on everything, not just this test as I had figured so what Chief didn't realize is, just because he got a "D" on this test, doesn't mean he had a passing grade overall lol.

So here it is boys, my final welds of this semester.

My fitup using the method I mentioned earlier for insuring a uniform gap




Root going in




My face weld to be cut



These were from Monday's cut and bend. Middle is the root bend and the right side is the first cover bend, and the left was a different section I cut hoping that it would be better, it was not.


Tonight's bends. Flawless victory.


This was the practice weld I did Monday that came out great. Wish my test had been as good








And now for some bonus pics, because I felt bad I didn't grab a bunch of my final pipe in action.

This is a years worth of shit accumulated in my locker. Carrying this up two flights of stairs was fun.


This is what's left of my trusty Lincoln gloves. I am really rough on gloves


This was my first attempt at the AWS plate test. I probably would have passed with this one, but I just didn't feel really good about the root, so I asked if I could make another.



Pretty sure I did these in my qualifications class, one is 3G and the other is 4G. For some reason they were still in my grinder bag and made it home, so I'll figure out something to do with em


This is a 2G open root plate strap I did some time ago which was also in my grinder bag and I frankly have no clue what I'll do with it. I'm accumulating way to much scrap metal




And this is a rough drawing of how chiefs bend went. I was going to take a picture but it was gone by the time I got around to it.

Alrighty guys I am now officially done with classes for this year.

I plan on going back this year when my Tig teacher is teaching the intro welding classes so I can do some practicing. I'm hoping to do some MIG welding as well since its been a while since I have touched a Mig gun. I also plan on keeping this thread active with updates on some of the home projects I have been working on.

I don't want this to get archived before I get done with the entire program, so feel free to post any questions you may have, pictures of projects YOU are working on, or really whatever welding related stuff you feel like. You may see the thread just be bumped (assuming the mods are OK with that) because I want my entire journey through trade school to be contained all in this one thread.

I started this as a thread to show my welds, and ask questions to people who know more. Its grown into something more for me now, and I can honestly say I am really proud of the progress I have made since I started it. I really hope that everyone has enjoyed this journey as much as I have.

It's been really incredible to be able to go back, and look at something I did and at the time and thought was pretty decent and then compare it to what I'm doing now. I still have a long journey ahead but knowing that I have come as far as I have is a pretty good feeling.

This thread should be a great example for all of you at home, who are not content with what your doing now and want a change. Maybe your dream is not to be a welder, but if you want something more in life, the only thing holding you back, is you. If I can go from not even having a clue about what welding really was, to being able to weld on a variety of metals in all positions, with all processes then you DEFINITELY can.

So stay tuned, I have some really cool projects yet to come.

I just took a look at this thread today. Outstanding work dude!

I went through the full time welding program at the cc where I used to live.  I graduated a few years ago, but I’ve definitely gotten rusty.

See prior to taking welding & fab, I took the machining program. Most of the jobs I’ve had since I graduated have been machining jobs, as I seem to find machining jobs that pay more. My current job being no exception.

At any rate, I finally have my new shop up at my new place(and power to it). I was kinda scratching my head, trying to remember what all we did in welding school(TBI doesn’t help with that unfortunately) 5 years ago. But this thread brought back a lot of what I couldn’t remember. Thank you for that.

For me, learning machining and welding were very empowering. I went from being an Infantryman-with essentially no other skills and no appealing job opportunities, to having 2 trades and lots of opportunities for work. It completely changed my life. And I really enjoy working with metal, so I like what I do.

Awesome man, I'm really glad to hear this has helped you out!

I also have to say how great this opportunity is for guys who got out of the military and don't have a clear path forward. There have been a lot of Ex Mil guys in almost every single one of my classes and they are by far some of the best students. Not to mention the GI bill covers the cost of going to school, and every teacher I have had has always worked really hard to help those guys get good paying jobs once the program ends.

And to keep this from being archived, I have some updates and some more pics of stuff I'm working on.

It has been insanely hot and humid these past two weeks so I did not do as much as I wanted on this, but its coming along. I am finally ready to share my design for this project, and I am really proud of it to be honest. It may be over engineered somewhat, but it was a blast coming up with the design, brain storming with my Dad on better options and then figuring out what I wanted it to look like and how I wanted it to function.

This is definitely not a new idea, but I think it is a better design then a lot of the dueling target stands because it allows you to use T posts, and packs up into a nice small package that can be transported in just about any vehicle.

I was able to use a plasma cutter to remove some of the excess metal but I unfortunately have a lot more grinding ahead of me.

The image is still not as large as I wanted, but you should be able to see all the area's that have to be welded. The Youtube stuff is my brother's channel and I plan on painting it on before I give it to him.
Link to detailed plans

Here's some pics of what I was working on. I made a mistake on the small 3/16th plate when I cut it, so I am going to re-cut new ones because I want it to basically sit on the pipes edge and go down the sides. I plan on Tig welding that. The rest will probably be done using 3/32 stick electrodes because my uncle has a Stick welder and is very near where I'm working on this.

This one shows 3 of the targets I plasma cut ready to be ground down to the final size. Underneath them are two more that I wish I could have cut, but will now use a cutoff wheel on. The yellow one with #1 cut side on it was actually two pieces, and I used a 6010 to weld it together, then cladded a few 1/8th 7018's to make sure I burned out any slag inclusions and to make sure it was flush with the base metal.


This is my box of parts to either be ground or welded. I substituted the rebar called for in the plans for framing pins because they were the perfect size and I had some bent ones I could salvage lengths of.


And this is the only actual target section I have managed to complete. It took much longer then I anticipated, but it went together exactly how I imagined.


And for a refresher, this is what I cut my targets from, and how many holes from a 5.56 my brother put in it . I filled the holes and then cladded the surface so they would be flush when ground down.

I can’t remember if I posted this yet, but dang cool thread OP.  Thanks for taking the time to keep it up to date, I find it super interesting.

Seatbelts, you've given me the motivation to get off my ass and sign up for classes.  AAS in welding.  It will be a wild ride, I'm sure.

Good for you. This thread is one of the things which pushed me to sign up for the class I took. I have two classes to go, and I can certainly stick two pieces of metal together now.

Fantastic man! I'm really glad it's been able to help someone, the only regret I have is not doing it years ago. Please keep us posted on how it's going, I would definitely be interested in hearing how the program runs where your at

Hell ya man, your closer then I am haha.

Best part of this entire process has been the confidence it's given me in my own abilities and potential. It's also been great because I love building stuff, and knowing that I can weld most any metals, in any position and with any of the process has made me go from being terrified of when I start looking for a job, to feeling confident that I can get a great job and pass any hiring tests.

Thanks for the compliments guys, it means a lot

Awesome thread man!!!! You've come a long way!

If you can swing it, grab a brush wheel and a cheap grinder from HF. Being able to really clean between passes makes a surprising difference when you're stick welding. And it saves your arm from brushing and chipping which is super helpful with the "always be comfortable" thing.

TAG for Updates

The bummer is I've got to do a bunch of general ed classes along the way.  I did sign up for Nondestructive Examination for the first semester.  That starts on the 15th if I recall correctly.

The real good news is I've got a class or two from years back that count towards the overall credit hours.

It will be January before I actually get into a classroom or lab setting.  It's all online for now.

I learned that one real fast haha. Using a hand wire brush was taking too much of my time, so I grabbed one a year ago. It actually crapped out on my final night of class, but it was only 30 bucks so no biggie.

The biggest problem with my last stick class was my teachers rules about grinders. In every class I have had him in, you were not allowed to use a grinder at all on your final. With pipe, you are supposed to grind your restarts and we had been and I was kinda shocked when he said we couldn't even do that. But luckily he had shown us how to restart without one, so my restarts were not terrible but not what I preferred. He wouldnt allow a wire wheel, or grinder until you got to the stage where you had to grind your coupon down to bend.

No other teacher has had that rule.

Damn that's wild. We were in the lab by the 3rd class in my program. Just doing some basic oxy torch cutting but we were at least in the lab.

I ran into the A problem with credits myself. I had done math and a ton of English classes, but apparently to graduate with the associates in welding I have to take an applied math class, but my English should count. The real bullshit comes from the required classes that are pointless. I have to spend about 500 bucks to take a "team building" class and a "college success" class.

NDE is pretty interesting, a girl in my last class did that and she said it was an enjoyable job. Best of luck when you get started, I know going back to school for anything can be really stressful especially when you have a job and all going on too.

I should have some updates coming soon, just some random project pics to keep the thread from archival. I'll post up my last classes grades in a couple days.

I'm lucky that my schedule allows for me to go full time and it wont be a financial burden.  The stress is already ratcheting up.  Reminds me of Cola Warrior SE3, getting there was obstacle zero and there were only coordinates, no street address.  Signing up has been one of the most frustrating experiences of my life.   The school's website is just horrible.  Plus it has been almost 20 years since I've done any studying.

That's been a major irritation for me as well. One of the flaws in my school's program has been the lack of hierarchy. When class opens online everyone jumps in a signs up in a first come first served way, which leads people who are almost done with the program fighting for the same class needed to graduate as a first year student whose doing the classes they advisor signed them up for.

We had a ridiculous number of people who were doing their second class ever in the higher level classes that were supposed to be locked via prerequisite but the class advisors just sign people up for anything, and never look to see what's required to actually get it.

The system also punishes people have to sign up online because they work during the day and can't go to school and wait hours to sit down and have a admin get you in all the classes you need for the year.

So as promised, here are my grades from this past semester.



I am not going to lie to you, I was pretty crushed that I got a B. My pipe welding wasn't the best and I had room for improvement no doubt, but I had hoped that working my ass off on the final and being one of two people to do 6g would have pushed me to the A but I guess it did not.
I had been expecting that I was going to eventually get something less then an A and now the pressure to maintain that perfect grade has been lifted, but it hopefully will be the last grade that's not an A.

I'm only doing the general ed classes so I can get them out of the way.  I can also do them online.  Next semester I will sign up for some in-person classes and have to drive across the county to get there.  I have to do Intro to Computers, lol.  I've been posting on this site for years.  You'd think that would be testing out of that class.    Also have to get that pesky English and Math done.  

I earned an A- in my intro to welding class. I'm pretty pumped about it, because I didn't think it would be possible. I'll probably take the TIG class in the summer so I can really focus on it like I did the general class.

Ahh gotcha, do you know how many classes are required for your program? I would be interested in seeing the difference between your program and the one I'm doing.

That is absolutely fantastic man, and I for one am stoked to hear someone else is taking a class, and kicking ass at it.

Feel free to post up some of your projects if you want to

I can honestly say, I am actually miss going to class. Its gonna be what feels like a lifetime before spring gets here and I can get back in the lab and weld in earnest. Classes here start back up in a couple weeks, so I may wait until they get settled and pop in to try and Tig weld for a bit.

What classes are you taking next?

Thanks. Everything we did in the class was very basic, but I did use the plasma cutter to make a nameplate for my classroom. I'll try to get a picture of it.

I'm taking basic machining next, and I'll probably do the advanced machining class in the winter semester. Next summer I'll take TIG, which should be a blast.

Nice so are you going to be more of a machinist? I personally loved Tig and when I start job hunting next year that's what I hope to get into.

So I promised I would keep you guys updated with some pictues, so here's a couple progress pics from my target.

I put in a small vice in my dad's shop, so I can really get some good grinding done. I was able to make much more progress on the plates today, and got 2 almost done and a third close to the same point. I also was able to cut one of the blocker plates to the size I wanted, so now I have a template for the other 5.

I have only been spending about 2 hours each Sunday on this, but its coming along pretty well and I am really hoping I'll be able to get started on the major welding in the next month or so.

Also got a pic of the base pipe, and what I did. I have managed to scrounge these parts completely, so no money has gone into the metal whatsoever so I took what I found and made it work. The major pipe section that will go over the "T" was supposed to be completely steel, but I just couldn't find one that was all steel and the correct size. I did find two sections of 2in pipe that were both pretty long, one galvanized and the other steel. So I took the galvanized pipe and cut it down, and added it to the steel pipe and Tig welded the two together. I was actually able to do this in my advanced Tig class, and my teacher was nice enough to help me do it correctly. I did it open root, but looking back I regret not just doing them as a butt joint and welding the outside because the more filler I added the more it tried to bow so its a bit thinner where the weld was but I didn't want to flush it out because all the heat was making it worse.

Here is my pipe section.



Here's my blocker plate on the pipe, its not exact yet but the goal is to be able to weld it to the pipe ledge, and down the length of the pipe.




Here's my progress on the circle targets. Still have some rounding to do, but it's going better then I expected. The first one shows where these were welded together, and then cladded. I swore I had a picture of them before I ground them down, but I guess I don't



This is the third one, still got quite a bit of grinding to get it down to size and shape.


A stack of them


A bit more fine shaping and this is done.

I'm taking classes so I can teach some sort of trades classes at the HS level. I'm already teaching, but I see a need for this in a huge way.

Thats awesome! I have had a bunch of guys in my class who started in HS, and are getting a full degree/cert from the program. I really wish I had something like this in HS, because for a lot of kids the thought process is that trades are for people who can't hack it in a 4 year school and the academics are pushed more then any kind of trades.

You're doing a great service to your students

If I recall correctly, the course requires 64 credit hours.  I'll look up the classes in the morning and post them.p

Damn that's about half more then is required for mine thank god. Mine is 37 if I recall correctly.

I forgot to share these pics a couple weeks ago, but I remembered to finally so here we go with a couple pics of stuff I'm working on in the downtime.

Class for the fall started up for all the guys who are beginning the program, but I am gonna take my teacher up on his offer to let me come in and weld a couple nights so I really hope to be back in the booth doing some TIG welding, in the coming weeks. I wanted to wait for class to get going before I bug my teacher about letting me take up space.

Still working on my project, took a couple weeks break though because of my birthday weekend two weeks ago and last week I just didn't have any extra time. Really hoping to finish grinding so I can get to welding it all up in the coming weeks.

The story with this: I currently am a Land Surveyor and while using the metal detector we came across a strong reading, and thinking we had the corner started digging. Instead of the iron we found this. According to the survey, the property had last been done in 1974, so this had undoubtedly been buried for some time. I decided to just hit it with a wire wheel and then a flapper disk, and after getting a edge back on it I'll hand file it the rest of the way and it will go into our inventory

Pitting was a bit worse then I expected, and had I really wanted to restore this I would have looked into electrolysis but since its going to be used and abused, I plan on just throwing a coat of nice red paint on it and calling it a day. Cool find none the less. And considering the amount of brush axes we have lost over the past 15 years this was an unexpected win for once




If you look closely you can actually see where it was welded together. I have wondered what process was used when it was done.


You can see a small bit of the original paint still on it.

So back to some welding pics, I found this in my parents garage. I made this in my second class I think, one of the early things I made in my first Stick class. It started off as a couple plates I cladded, and then I connected them on a slant and figured it could be a small little target.

Finally got around to trying it out with my brothers new APC9. For what its worth, the plate size is 3/8ths and withstands most pistol calibers at close range. (make sure to angle it if you make something similar)




You can really see the lack of ability in this one The plate wasn't tacked so the heat caused it to draw up.


This one really highlights the hard time I was having with fillet welds. It poorly fused and also had a great deal of undercut


I also really didn't understand what I was supposed to be doing with cladding, so my beads were really stretched out and didn't tie in, and I was also traveling to fast.

I've been taking machinist classes for awhile.  I love it and hope to make a mid career change in the next few years.

I just found this thread and realized I also need to take welding classes.  You guys keep saying this looks great or that looks bad.  I can't tell the difference with any of it except that it all looks better than any of my welds.  Apparently I have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to welding.

Haha that's something you kind of pick up on the more classes you take, and the more welds you lay down. I remember thinking how great some of my welds looked when I first started, and now looking back I'm able to see exactly where something failed to penetrate, or where I undercut something and so on.

We get a good number of Machinists coming into our program because I think a couple welding classes are required to graduate in that program, most love it.

The other side of that is not all welds that are structurally sound look perfect. Some don't look pretty at all but they get the job done and at the end of the day, that's what really matters.

I forgot about the pics I took a couple weeks ago. I am finally on the cusp of finishing this project and I am really excited to finally be able to weld it all up.

I would have finished the prep work when I took these pics, but I had literally used my last cutting wheel, and ground my last disk down to where it was almost pointless to continue. The amount of time it's taken to grind this shit has been unreal. I'm not quite done shaping the actual targets, but it's close enough that I feel like I can actually weld them and then put the finishing touches on the shape. I had imagined that I was going to get them perfectly round, but I have come to the realization that without a laser cutter its just not going to be as perfect as I imagined and that's ok.

Right now the biggest hurdle by far is going to be cutting this last one out. It just takes a fuck ton of time to get the basic shape cut out using these cutting wheels and I regret not just using the plasma cutter at school on all of them when I had the chance. I also realized that I had used the wrong diameter on the last five so I have room to really grind them to a near perfect circle. The completed one is a 6in plate and the rest are 8in but I have not decided if I really want to cut 2in off all the ones I have shaped. Its a major time killer.

I selected where I want the connecting bar located,  and am going to cut the bar stock Sunday and finish cutting the blocking plates for sure and I'll hopefully get the last target plate at least cut out.

The real hard part is choosing what process I want to use to do this with. I thought my uncle had a Tig welder but he was confusing Mig and Tig, so right now the only options I have are stick welding and Mig. I'm leaning towards just doing it with stick, but I have some concerns with using stick on the thin metal backing bars, but I may do a test one and see how it goes and commit to doing it after I see how it comes out.

I'm also going to try and size it a bit differently. Right now the height is going to be a bit much, especially when you factor in the clearance needed for them to swing past each other. I had sized the holder so that it wouldn't create pressure and drag as it swings but if I can reduce the length of the pipe holder and the rebar I would like to do it to make it more compact and easier to transport.


This is where I'm at. All but one is pretty much completed and ready to be welded.






I got the top left connecting arm cut to fit (it looks smaller but I measured it to match the completed one)



This is the average size the cutting wheels are when I finally toss it. I have learned that the HF cutting wheels are cheap for a reason. The just disintegrate 10x faster then even cheap dewalt ones.


And for those of you who do what I do and skim threads and are wondering what the fuck I'm talking about or working on, here's the specific sections of the dueling stand I'm currently working on
Attached File


And this will be the finished project when I'm finally done. The goal I had in mind from the beginning is taking an awesome idea that already existed, and modifying it some so that it can be more easily transported. I want my brother to be able to easily pack this up and fit it in his 4Runner.
Attached File

Just asking the question, but why not just weld the flat bar on the back of the circle rather than to the side? It would seem to avoid putting a joint in a high stress area and having to grind out that radius.