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Up Topic Welding Industry / General Welding Discussion / Made in the USA??
- - By WeldinFool (**) Date 07-16-2012 18:25
The company I work for purchased a new piece of metal fabrication equipment for their shop. The purchase price, which was around $280,000 USD, included installation. After the installation people left, we started taking a closer look at what we had just bought. We started noticing that some of the welding wasn't real good, and in fact there was even some welds missing. We climbed inside the thing and found a welding inspector's worst nightmare! (see pics). I have literally hundreds of pictures like this from just this one piece of equipment. And it was made in the USA!!
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Parent - - By 65 Pipeliner (**) Date 07-16-2012 18:37
It's on the inside, nobody will see it there. :wink: My question is, If things are that far off they need pieces of rod to fill the gaps, how accurate is the machine going to be?

Chris
Parent - By welderbrent (*****) Date 07-16-2012 19:12
Chris,

Check your private messages please.

Have a Great Day,  Brent
Parent - By 99205 (***) Date 07-16-2012 19:34
There's no way they could of sold that piece of equipment that cheaply, if they had hired "professional" welders to work for them.  :roll:
Parent - By welderbrent (*****) Date 07-16-2012 19:58
That is one sorry looking piece of equipment. 

I'd be ashamed to have my name on it as the manufacturer, inspector (if there was one even in house), or the buyer/end user. 

They need to take that back and start all over.  If they are even capable of doing any better.

Have a Great Day,  Brent
Parent - By TimGary (****) Date 07-16-2012 20:01
I hope your company rejects the equipment.
It might be too late now though...

Tim
Parent - By LHoage (*) Date 07-16-2012 22:54
That is crazy!!
Parent - By Cumminsguy71 (*****) Date 07-17-2012 00:28 Edited 07-17-2012 00:34
What did you guys expect for $280,000?? :lol:

That is just sad! I had to save the pictures. Always looking for more "quality" welds to show people and laugh about!
Parent - - By Rafter_G_Weldin (***) Date 07-17-2012 04:09
Those welds look as bad as the 1s on some frac tanks I've repaired made by dragon tanks in Louisiana. I asked the salesman from dragon about weld test and inspectors and there are none. And they don't pay the warranty repair bill either
Parent - - By HillbillyWelder (**) Date 07-17-2012 10:23
Thats the high demand, low pay(I mean no pay) welding jobs everybody is talking about.
Parent - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-18-2012 03:53
Hillbilly nailed it!

This is a "certified welder" at his/her very best.....:eek:.....holy crap, man!!!!!
Parent - - By texwelder (***) Date 07-21-2012 00:29
Right I have seen brand new frac pumps and blenders hit the first Jon and leak like a sprinkler and then they call me. They butt the pipe together no bevel  and run a log bead around it, and they pay over a million for these.
Parent - - By Rafter_G_Weldin (***) Date 07-21-2012 01:30
Yup over priced junk. Acid tanks are even worse
Parent - - By texwelder (***) Date 07-21-2012 04:02
Right I have seen some them on frac jobs that welds male me throw up in my mouth a little and then those guys will try tell you they are certified and can weld anything, then there welds look like bird crap
Parent - - By Rafter_G_Weldin (***) Date 07-21-2012 04:49
My 13 yr old daughter can weld better then the trigger monkeys they have
Parent - - By texwelder (***) Date 07-21-2012 05:02
Trigger monkeys thats funny right there
Parent - - By Rafter_G_Weldin (***) Date 07-21-2012 05:13
From what the rep told me if you can breath and hold a mig gun you were hired even offered me a job I passed told him I wouldn't put my name on junk like that
Parent - - By rcwelding (***) Date 07-21-2012 05:50
I was working for a company that built frac trailers. They lost the contract to a company that ran Miller Bobcats and spool guns.  They started fabing the supply lines with no gap just butt it up and cap it.  They said no need for a full pen weld. Everything was going to be max 200psi so it was all low pressure.
Parent - By texwelder (***) Date 07-21-2012 14:52
Yeah and even at 200 psi it will leak but those companies don't care because that stuff has no warranty so when it starts leaking the company that bought it has to pay for the repairs
- - By TAC (*) Date 07-16-2012 18:53
Exactly what type of equipment is it?
Parent - - By Tommyjoking (****) Date 07-16-2012 23:38
YEa  who made it and what is it.....was it actually made here or "assembled here"....the rules are basically that they can unbox anything off a truck or a boat and slap a sticker on it and then be able to say "proudly made in the USA"....because a % of the process was conducted here.

Either way you go they have a loose open container policy in that factory!!!!!
Parent - - By Cumminsguy71 (*****) Date 07-17-2012 00:33
You nailed it right on the head Tommy! The free trade b.s. I bought some cedar planks from the home store. As we are sitting there my wife asks, "what's this mean" and she shows me the made in sticker. I looked at it and just started to laugh. Materials Canada, Made in China(like I had to say that right), Packaged in USA. So they chop down a bunch of trees, send them across the pond to China where they make them into cedar planks to cook my salmon on. Then ship them back here so somebody can throw some plastic wrap around them! It's hard to believe that they can burn all of the diesel fuel over and back and still make out cheaper.

Free trade, how about equal pay regs to level the playing field. Poor sap cutting the wood in China's probably making a couple dollars a day.
Parent - - By Dualie (***) Date 07-17-2012 01:56
absolutely SHAMEFUL! 

Who made this and what machine is it so we can all avoid them like the plague.
Parent - - By Cumminsguy71 (*****) Date 07-17-2012 09:21
I can't afford a $280k machine but sure would be nice to avoid anything else they make!
Parent - By Mat (***) Date 07-17-2012 09:55
What's the machine do?  (supposed to do?)  :eek:
Parent - - By WeldinFool (**) Date 07-17-2012 15:41 Edited 07-17-2012 18:06
Don't want to get too specific, hate to attract the attention of a hungry lawyer or lawsuit-happy businessman, but I will tell you that the equipment in those pictures is used to sandblast steel parts. After complaining to the guy who sold it to us he asked us to run it for a month or so, and we did. Had steel shot flying everywhere in no time, the idiots hadn't put several of the shielding wear-plates in and the thing was eating holes through itself! They sent out a kid with a welding hood and his own little roll of wire to "fix it". We use this equipment extensively and have worked out most of the bugs on our own (can't even count the hours we've spent patching things up). I just don't go to that area of the shop very often because I can't stand to look at those welds! Here's a few more pics:
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Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 07-17-2012 15:55 Edited 07-17-2012 17:46
WeldinFool, so is it a wheelabrator? If so, it will definitely be tough on all of the various components of the system no matter how it is built. However, when it is new the craftsmanship on it shouldn't include the types of things that your initial photos showed. Unfortunately, much of the equipment that is manufactured around the U.S. is under what I have often heard termed O.E.M., as such there are not codes in place for much of this to govern welding quality or engineering control. I have a feeling this is one of those instances. Some companies who fall into this category have a realization that their sales and continued success are tied to their quality and they take that seriously and heed the requirements that this would entail. I have also been around some outfits that believe that there is enough untapped business that even if they "screw-up" a bunch there will still be enough new business to allow them to continue. It sounds to me as if you folks will personally end up addressing the shortcomings here and eventually work the bugs out on your own and eventually have a very functional and reliable piece of equipment. Good luck and best regards, Allan
Parent - - By WeldinFool (**) Date 07-17-2012 16:11
Hey, you said it, I didn't. Got that, legal people? He said "Wheel-a-Brator", not me! And you are correct, even after their "repair welder" left there were still many issues that we had to fix on our own, we just got tired of calling them. The notes shown in the pictures were from one of our shop guys, I really don't spell that bad! These welds look even worse in our shop because our guys put out a very high quality product with welds that always look great. Pretty disappointing that someone would put down welds like that and think it is acceptable.
Parent - By Tommyjoking (****) Date 07-17-2012 22:39
I would not worry about litigation whatsoever....you are just showing pictures of a product.  If this company cannot fix and stand behind their work the litigation can easily swing the other way. That does not even qualify as welding...the word pathetic comes to mind. It sickens me that profitability has so easily mowed down the idea of craftsmanship, pride and reputation, but that has happened in a lot of industries.  History teaches that those companies that go that route will not survive the long run and they will leave the rest of us to pick up the pieces and profit from their mistakes.
Parent - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 07-18-2012 04:03
"That company" used to make good machines. We had some at the truck frame plant that withstood the test of time.

Of course Our maintenance  people were forever replacing the manganese wear plates in them, but that is part of the routine maintenance  on machines like these.
Parent - - By Cumminsguy71 (*****) Date 07-18-2012 00:09
I'm sorry, I just can't help but laugh my butt off looking at those pictures!!!
Parent - - By Dualie (***) Date 07-18-2012 05:50
well when your really the only game in town i guess you can serve people crap on a plate and force them to eat it.

I have seen things built in muddy fields by people with nothing more than an 8th grade education that look leaps and bounds better than that.
Parent - - By WeldinFool (**) Date 07-18-2012 15:27 Edited 07-18-2012 15:54
I mentioned to our shop supervisor that I had posted these pictures on the forum and he asked me to tell everybody that, according to the salesman that sold this to us (by the way, this is not a Wheelabrator brand, but one of their cheaper competitors, sorry Wheelabrator), these people had received more orders than they could handle and had been forced to "sub-out" the welding operations on some of their equipment. I believe he said this particular machine had been welded at a shop in Kansas, and that after our numerous complaints these guys are no longer part of the team. I hope this shop is not building anything more than garbage bins and the like, but who knows, they could be the guys welding those nuclear containment trailers that you drive next to on the freeway everyday! The machine itself is a great design, and we use it daily with pretty good results. Most of the bad welds are just an aesthetic problem, but there were several places that were so bad the steel shot would come right out of the machine, we had to flag off the area while it was in use!
Parent - - By 99205 (***) Date 07-18-2012 17:09
They should of sent an Inspector to that shop to QA.  If nothing else, it shows the company cares about their reputation.  The extra cost is minimal compared to the loss of sales, because of poor workmanship.
Parent - - By 803056 (*****) Date 07-19-2012 00:13
No manufacturer that has any intention of growing their business wants to see photos of poor quality available for all to see on the internet. It is a major embarrassment.

I would send a letter to the machine manufacturer and tell the CEO to follow the link where the photographs of the poor “quality” product are on display for all to see. Any CEO worth a nickel would be embarrassed to see those photographs. If I were the CEO I would be looking for those responsible and a few heads would roll. I doubt there would be any handshakes and pats on the back for a job well done.

As for naming the manufacturer; there is no libel if the photographs are not staged. The facts speak for themselves. You are not saying anything that can be construed as libel if the statements are factual and contain no embellishment of the conditions observed. 

Best regards – Al
Parent - - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-22-2012 04:45
Boys, I hate to say it but EVERYTHING is crap nowadays, unless a proud tradesman cranks it out. Nothing is built to last anymore, and nothing makes more money than selling crap. And nothing will change it. Crap is here to stay because American society, itself, is CRAP. And crap is feces, by the way.

Goodnight.:roll:
Parent - By 803056 (*****) Date 07-22-2012 12:54
Tell us how you really feel Sourdough.

Al:grin:
Parent - By Northweldor (***) Date 07-22-2012 13:30
"...unless a proud tradesman cranks it out...."

And sometimes, even a proud tradesman will crank out crap!:grin:
Up Topic Welding Industry / General Welding Discussion / Made in the USA??

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