Seeing other peoples work.........

[craigthewelder]

I'm not sure whether this is the right forum but.......

The other day a wagon from our galvanizes called in with some heavy structural box section on it and they had some of the worst welding on them i've ever seen. Welds were low,high, no fusion what so ever, porosity and very untidy, now i know something like that would never leave my shop in a million year.
Has QA really gone down the pan that much?? When i look at this thread and see the pride of work involved i just can't see us ever getting that back. I know the current finical climate is very harsh but turning **** work out is to know ones advantage.

End of my rant..............

 

[HOUNDMAGNET]

Hi,i agree some workmanship these days is appauling.
im a maintainance engineer for ABP (ports)....i have seen ship repairs that are so bad you would not want to sail on the ship!
I have seen a road fuel tanker with 1/4" plate tacked on to its chassis frame,that was so bad my 18yr old daughter who has never welded would have done better.
How do these safety critical jobs get bye without inspection?

Welding is a small part of my job but i wouldnt dare let a job go unless it was of a good quality,i cant and wont risk it with a crane that can lift 10 tons! or a tug winch frame that has a pulling capacity of 25 ton.
Thats two jobs i have recently had.

 

[cookie munsta]

mate i completely agree but what you might find that with a global skills crisis, more gov. dept. are more interested in getting people qualfied than getting them skilled.
another is attitude, i've had the experience of work as t/a few years ago on $20m+ project and the trades man or the idiot they issued a ticket to was of the opinion that he woulndn't be there in however many years it would take for his work to fail and i qoute "We won't be on this site when it *&^%'s up", maybe making him complete some form of procedure sheet may have changed his mind as a permenant record of accountability would be on file. other than that

 

[Hitch]

I dont think its a lack of skill in a lot of cases, more a 'I can't be bothered' atitude.

 

[will123thomas]

its shamefull doing not only a bad job but a dangerous job.
Im doing my apprenticeship at the moment, started this time last year doing mostly mig in college and started in my company at the start of april which is mostly tig on stainless, im learning new things everyday and obviously still make some mistakes, i wouldnt dream of trying to send a job out that i wasnt happy with, its poor workmanship and when it goes wrong its my neck on the line and depending what it is, maybe someones life!

 

[rosco454]

I dont think its a lack of skill in a lot of cases, more a 'I can't be bothered' atitude.

I definitely agree with that,im a virtual welding novice but regularly see bits of work where i think i could do much better.Not just welding,see the same attitude from perfectly competent people all the time no matter what the job.

 

[Arsonista]

Most buyers, sorry, procurement executives, these days only see the price. They couldn't give a monkey's about the quality.

 

[HOUNDMAGNET]

I believe that a lot of the problems arise because specialists are rarely used to do the work.Take me for example,although i believe im a competant welder and probably would pass some codings,these are never needed despite me working on cranes,tug boats,heavy machinary etc.
I took an engineering apprentiship that covered all disiplines but i ended up specialising in electronics!.....a great deal of my job is fault finding on control systems but i also do mechanical refurbs and maintainance including welding.
Twenty years ago,if something needed welding,they got in a welder,now we,the maintainance engineers are expected to do it unless it is in the petro/chemical equipment where they do get coded engineers in.
Thats the only good things that the unions offered,they protected each trade area,requiring a "trademen" to do the job.
When i did my training at British Aerospace,the factory stopped work one day because a draftsman was caught using a milling machine in the toolroom one dinner time.All he was doing was "proving" a small design,there was no 3d cad back then and all the drawings were done by hand.Only the largest sites had a cad machine........but the unions said that machining was the job of the toolmakers,hence the walk out!

 

[will123thomas]

"Thats the only good things that the unions offered,they protected each trade area,requiring a "trademen" to do the job"

the trouble nowadays is unions have no power anymore thanks to a certain primeminister no names mentioned but it was a women (thats not meant in a sexist way btw)

"Most buyers, sorry, procurement executives, these days only see the price. They couldn't give a monkey's about the quality. "

couldnt agree more, as long as its done fast, does the job its meant to and it looks pretty then quality doesnt matter espectially on site work!

 

[Pete.]

We had a lifting point fail on a bottle cage the other day. No harm done as it had four loops and only two bottles in it but it was obviously taken out of service. When we looked at it the weld on the lifting loop had zero penetration - where the weld tore off it was flat as a piece of new steel.

 

[pedrobedro]

I have seen a road fuel tanker with 1/4" plate tacked on to its chassis frame,that was so bad my 18yr old daughter who has never welded would have done better.
How do these safety critical jobs get bye without inspection?

I have been to HGV test stations and can assure you that this would not be on the road after it's next test. They are ultra strict and very little gets by them safety wise.

 

[Wedg1e]

I work in the non-destructive testing industry and it seems to be the case that it doesn't matter whether the job's done properly as long as the PAPERWORK says the job was done properly.

As long as we don't have the death penalty then you can't be put against a wall and shot no matter how badly you f***- up and as murderers generally get slapped wrists, what's the likely punishment for a welder whose work fails and drops an oil rig into the sea?

Probably a fine, and you can bet that it'd be for the environmental mess or loss of revenue, not for any loss of life.

Cynical, me? Oh yes.

 

[dannyweld]

, those old pics are great but dont forget about the titanic, it cracked in half. all the way from ruthless bosses down to thuggish unions the whole industry was slowly destroyed. i thinkl the quailty is still out there you got to find it, i bought a mig wire snipes made in england, 15 pounds, it will last, but how many people buy the rubbish down in machine mart. there was plenty of rubbish produced 25, 50 years ago, which is long gone now, same as the junk made to which will be long gone in a generations time.

 

[RedOrZed]

When i did my training at British Aerospace,the factory stopped work one day because a draftsman was caught using a milling machine in the toolroom one dinner time.All he was doing was "proving" a small design,there was no 3d cad back then and all the drawings were done by hand.Only the largest sites had a cad machine........but the unions said that machining was the job of the toolmakers,hence the walk out!

I was too young to work in the union days, but that does seem to be the kind of attitude the certain PM was fighting against, and what lead to the downfall of the unions.

the draftsman wasn't given a bollocking, or asked not to do it again, but the whole factory was shut down? And this wasn't an isolated incident in union run shops, was it? It's no wonder the gubbermint had to step in, such utter stupidity couldn't carry on, it was clearly killing the country

 

[craigthewelder]

I dont think its a lack of skill in a lot of cases, more a 'I can't be bothered' atitude.

I totally agree, but i would hope that some involved in the job stand up and say thats not good enough. When i was a apprentice i used to fear the inspectors coming round to check jobs, now i wish there was more of them!

Most buyers, sorry, procurement executives, these days only see the price. They couldn't give a monkey's about the quality.

This is also very true, especially the way thing are at the mo. Some of the jobs we get out bid on are ridicules, firms doing jobs for less than we can buy the materials for.

 

[Tino]

Most buyers, sorry, procurement executives, these days only see the price. They couldn't give a monkey's about the quality.

I couldn't agree more, it's a problem we have all the time. People often say we are to expensive, but we make good stuff. The problem is a lot of the work we do cant be seen once the job is finished. A weld without a prep under it looks the same as a weld with a prep under it but could take hours less time. Try explaining to the buyers the difference, blank looks all round.

 

[Tino]

, those old pics are great but dont forget about the titanic, it cracked in half.

Yep that is true. But to be fair it did hit a f*****n great lump of ice first!

 

[Seano]

Yep that is true. But to be fair it did hit a f*****n great lump of ice first!

And the hull was manufactured from dodgy steel.... the bulkhead compartment design was a world leader in shipbuilding.....but someone should have told them a compartment is only watertight if it is welded all the way around....


WcW

 

[scott0031]

And the hull was manufactured from dodgy steel.... the bulkhead compartment design was a world leader in shipbuilding.....but someone should have told them a compartment is only watertight if it is welded all the way around....


WcW

It wasnt actually the hull itself that was the problem, it was the use of lower grade iron rivets to save on costs. For the sake of what in those days would have been little money compared to the overall cost, thousands die. Havent learnt that much in all that time have we really? It still comes down to do a job as cheap as possible.

 

[dannyweld]

was on HMS belfast on sunday, the welding on that ship is dreadfull, the decay set in years ago, to be honest i think its a myth that things where built better years ago. if you want top notch you just have to pay for it, if not then you get the cheaper version, an option not available a generation ago.