you might be better off taking the $40,000 or so, to put a decent well equipt rig together, to vegas-it'd be a lot more fun than the feast and famine of running a rig.
Thats a very good topic, with all the new comers I've seen asking questions!!
My Dad was a pipeliner in Odessa, TX in late 70's . I remember watching him test a few times, not understanding what was actually going on being born in '74, but was so intrigued with the idea of turning steel into liquid and it transforming into something amazing (to me) when it cooled. I started learning to weld 5p and LH when I was in jr high from Dad. I helped him on pipe fabrication projects when he brought them home. By the time I got to metal fabrication in high school, I could out weld , out cut, out fab the shop teachers. Boy, did I have the big head! I got called on to fix all sorts of stuff in Ag and FFA. My Sr year, I singed up for DECA (high school work program) just to get out of classes at lunch, but found a job as a welder helper working in the diaries around Comanche, TX. Bout a week later, and I was taking the truck out myself to do smaller jobs. Took my first real weld test at Ross Co in Brownwood, TX building portable cement batch plants at the age of 18. A year later, I decided I needed some adventure, so I enlisted in the Navy. Six years later, got out and went to tanking for TBI out of Euless, TX as lead welder and crane operator. Finally found enough money to put a rig together in 2001 and been running as hard as I can ever since. Never turn down an opportunity to weld next to an an "old timer". He can teach you more in a day then a year of college!
You only get back what you are willing to put into welding. There is so much more for me to learn about the trade. Everything I know about welding now has been self taught this far, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.
If a man wants to work in this field he must first realize that its not a job, but a life style, and to accept it for what it is. Not everyone is cut out for this life. Some days are gravy, others make you ready to snap.
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