Welder from Watford

[danbrown89]

Good afternoon all,

I co-run a welding & metal fabrication company in Watford. 60+ year family business of which I'm 4th generation.

Looking to expand into new markets and work with new clients. Hearing so many stories about welding companies closing down due to owners retiring...... obviously not a 'sexy' trade like plumbing or sparks!

 

[slim_boy_fat]

Welcome aboard, Dan.

 

[dobbslc]

Hi I'm not far from you guys.
There won't be many sparks around soon if we don't start getting a bit of respect for our trade. Smart **** office staff think they're above us "site workers" they seem to forget they are ONLY there because we are!
Anyway what sort of work do you do?

 

[danbrown89]

95% of our work is in mild steel so my welding capabilites are fairly limited, although extensive in Mig & Arc.

We do a lot of planned/reactive maintenance for some national bluechips which keeps the weeks interesting, other than that its a variety of general metal work for resi/commercial contractors!

Where abouts are you based dobbslc? what work do you do?

 

[dobbslc]

I'm an electrician in case you didn't work that one out from the above rant
I do work all over the London area on site electrics manly 3 phase transformer, tower crane, site power and lighting etc.
Not too technically challenging but a few jobs have been interesting over the years.

 

[Richard.]

Hi Dan. Welcome. a good way to extend your branches would be to get involved with other materials and processes.
Aluminium and stainless with Mig and Tig opens a good few more doors and as you've been welding for a long time even if Tig is new to you I would say you'd pick it up quickly.

 

[danbrown89]

Hi Dan. Welcome. a good way to extend your branches would be to get involved with other materials and processes.
Aluminium and stainless with Mig and Tig opens a good few more doors and as you've been welding for a long time even if Tig is new to you I would say you'd pick it up quickly.

Thanks Richard, I'm looking into that sort of thing at the moment. I'd be open to any recommendations on qualifications/training courses

 

[Richard.]

Thanks Richard, I'm looking into that sort of thing at the moment. I'd be open to any recommendations on qualifications/training courses

I can help with a 1-1 session to get you started as your not a million miles from me. I've done over 20 members on here from all skill levels. Pm me if your interested.

 

[Mee]

I agree with Richard on this one, you can never have too much experience and you can never have too much knowledge, and when you work for yourself, or in a senior position it benefits you when you can speak to clients and understand their often ramblings about what they want and how they can achieve it.
I work for a company operating in several fields and a lot of our work is done for other parts/divisions of the company and a lot is done for regular clients; up to Christmas it was a number of standard and non standard work mainly for several of our petrochem clients wanting to undertake major works during the Christmas shutdown.

 

[daleyd]

was a number of standard and non standard work mainly for several of our petrochem clients wanting to

So that's just "work" then?

Welcome on board dan!