Welding cost increases?

[Cato]

Following on from chatting about digger prices (IRL) increasing a lot of the costs for components is relatively easy to see.

Is there a figure for the increased cost of welding? I'm thinking percentage per inch of mig for steel or similar measure. Gas, electricity and steel have all increased so aside from the material cost in a boom or bucket the cost of sticking them together must be well up too.

 

[mike os]

15% wouldn't be unreasonable at the mo

 

[James1979]

15% wouldn't be unreasonable at the mo

15% seems to crop up a lot in changes of rates.

 

[Cato]

No wonder anything where welding is involved has shot up then. I dread to think what that does to the price of a ship.

 

[Brad93]

Following on from chatting about digger prices (IRL) increasing a lot of the costs for components is relatively easy to see.

Is there a figure for the increased cost of welding? I'm thinking percentage per inch of mig for steel or similar measure. Gas, electricity and steel have all increased so aside from the material cost in a boom or bucket the cost of sticking them together must be well up too.

It wasn't particularly profitable before and now it's pointless. basically.

Really, it needs to be at an hourly rate the same as other trades. Main dealer workshop is £75 an hour.

 

[James1979]

It wasn't particularly profitable before and now it's pointless. basically.

Really, it needs to be at an hourly rate the same as other trades. Main dealer workshop is £75 an hour.

Thing is, it needs everyone to do it and it be accepted norm.

Unfortunately you’ll always get one Pratt do it for pence to undercut everyone else

 

[Cato]

It wasn't particularly profitable before and now it's pointless. basically.

Really, it needs to be at an hourly rate the same as other trades. Main dealer workshop is £75 an hour.

I think there will need to be a big adjustment in rates for many trades in the not too distant future. If there isn't it will be very difficult to get a wide range of things done because there won't be anyone to do them.

 

[Trevorleach]

I think there will need to be a big adjustment in rates for many trades in the not too distant future. If there isn't it will be very difficult to get a wide range of things done because there won't be anyone to do them.

I think the gap between minimum/living wage and a skilled persons wage is to small.

 

[stuvy]

Thing is, it needs everyone to do it and it be accepted norm.

Unfortunately you’ll always get one Pratt do it for pence to undercut everyone else

That’s one of the problems

Either people are willing to work for pittance or like the farmers when they all clubbed together and put milk up unjustly, some people just get greedy

 

[stuvy]

I think the gap between minimum/living wage and a skilled persons wage is to small.

Your correct there but almost all employers think they are paying the “going rate”

 

[Erie Fred]

Toyota dealership garage rate is $125 an hour...
so that is L103.35 per hour.
Many fab shops are $75 hour, some are higher.

 

[Cato]

Toyota dealership garage rate is $125 an hour...
so that is L103.35 per hour.
Many fab shops are $75 hour, some are higher.

To be fair though, my labour rate would be high too if I had to pay for an army of suit clad tossers sales executives and a cappa-frapp-lattechino machine on free vend.

 

[Erie Fred]

To be fair though, my labour rate would be high too if I had to pay for an army of suit clad tossers sales executives and a cappa-frapp-lattechino machine on free vend.

SIGN ME UP !....

Seriously, the $75 weld shop is my neighbors, just 2 brothers, CNC plasma, press brake (400 ton) some welding equip.
What I call a "Burn & Bend" shop.

 

[Cobbler]

I expect it’s the same the world over, half a dozen mechanics scorting their guts out on not much money to generate enough to pay for a dozen or more in suits that generate nothing.

 

[Robotstar5]

To be fair though, my labour rate would be high too if I had to pay for an army of suit clad tossers sales executives and a cappa-frapp-lattechino machine on free vend.

I went into a Land Rover dealership and found they no longer have a spares counter, just a chap in a nice suit and tie sitting behind as polished desk, I gave him the part number of what I wanted, he disappeared for a few minutes, came back with the part then wanted to charge me more than double what I could get it for online, I left him with the part on his desk.

 

[Onthespotwelding]

I think the biggest problem is YouTube.

If you wanted to learn to weld college/ apprenticeship would of been your go to.

Now some idiot watches a YouTube video thinks they are an expert, buys a welder, messes it up.

Then expects you to fix it for peanuts.

 

[Cato]

I think the biggest problem is YouTube.

If you wanted to learn to weld college/ apprenticeship would of been your go to.

Now some idiot watches a YouTube video thinks they are an expert, buys a welder, messes it up.

Then expects you to fix it for peanuts.

I agree, but I think it started with 'de-skilling' in industries. Trades now are broken down into smaller elements and pay dropped with the reduction. You can be a plasterer now if you can apply skim and nothing else, a welder if you can use a MIG to weld brackets to plates and nothing else, a mechanic if you can read a fault code and swap a sensor etc etc. In the past those things would be one part of a much wider skill set and the rates were set according to what you were qualified and able to do rather than what you were doing that day.

 

[Onthespotwelding]

I agree, but I think it started with 'de-skilling' in industries. Trades now are broken down into smaller elements and pay dropped with the reduction. You can be a plasterer now if you can apply skim and nothing else, a welder if you can use a MIG to weld brackets to plates and nothing else, a mechanic if you can read a fault code and swap a sensor etc etc. In the past those things would be one part of a much wider skill set and the rates were set according to what you were qualified and able to do rather than what you were doing that day.

Your not wrong. There is a place down the road builds bodies for tippers trailers ect.

Those boys are on £10 an hour!

 

[Cato]

Your not wrong. There is a place down the road builds bodies for tippers trailers ect.

Those boys are on £10 an hour!

50p above minimum wage

 

[Keith 66]

It starts in school, Not so many years ago when i was a D&T technician every few months we would get a new bunch of yr 7's in for their D&T rotation. Many would be looking forward to making things, Quite often because their older siblings or parents had done it & enjoyed it.
When i started there we made a simple jewellery box, It used 1m of 12mm x 70mm pine & two small squares of 1.5mm ply 150mm square. All of them learnt a few basic skills & got something to take home to mum. Most were pretty grim but some were very good.
But a few years before i left we were told "The project was too expensive" And so the search for ever cheaper & smaller pieces of ****e went on. You could see the poor kids getting demoralized as soon as they were told what to do. As a technician i was on a bit more than min wage, the Lsa's were barely on min wage at all.
Today if a kid takes D&T as a subject choice it is 90% theory with Teacher or Techie doing demo's, they are never allowed to actually make stuff.
In year 11 their last year at school they have to make a final project, this has to have folios of development sketches, drawings, research, cardboard prototypes etc etc, they were given 40 hours to do all this in. The project was then allowed just 8 hours making time out of a whole year.
It was decreed that the Quality of the finished article was irrelevant, Rather the original idea was marked higher. And so a project made out of toilet roll tubes, duct tape & dollops of hot glue could quite likely be graded higher that something that a kid had made with skill.

The fact is practical skills are not taught properly & are not valued.