Hello Jon,
I was quite amazed with your answer as I have been directly involved with numerous instances of this happening and after having a quick look through the code I could not see it mentioned anywhere.
I have worked as an independant CWI for company A (the client) who has contracted the work out to company B (the contractor).
The welders from company B have been qualified to the WPS's provided by company A under my direct supervision.
Then the work has been performed in accordance with company A's weld procedures again under my direct supervision.
I know this question should be directed to the ASME committee and not yourself but if I own a procedure surely I should be able to have anyone I nominate weld using my procedure as long as I maintain operational control over all welding.
As an example, I am a major engineering company with numerous qualified weld procedures. There is a small engineering company down the road with 3 competent welders but no qualified weld procedures.
I need pipework done for a major power station outage, some chromolly, some carbon and some stainless.Do I make this 3 man company spend thousands of dollars on qualifying all their own procedures that they may never use again or do I provide them with my procedures and supervise all their welding,
Your thoughts would be appreciated,
Regards,
Shane
I failed to see how this company can have competent welders, but do not have any welding procedures in place. So, what have the welders been qualified too.
Anyway, the easy way out is for you to put the welders on your payrole and do the supervision. Our union has numerous welding procedures qualified. We dispatch welders to contractors all the time, but the contractor has to have a duplicate of our welding procedure in order to keep within the guidlines on the codes. Keep in mind the welders have got to be qualified to the appropriate procedure. If we do not have a specific procedure qualified, then we bring in the companies rep. with their procedure and qualify the welder(s) at our shop to that procedure.
Hope this helps!
Welder 5354,
The example I mentioned was purely hypothetical.
You stated that
"We dispatch welders to contractors all the time, but the contractor has to have a duplicate of our welding procedure in order to keep within the guidlines on the codes."
What is the difference between what you are doing and what I have been doing.The contractor (company B) has been given a copy of company A's weld procedures in order to carry out the work. Where the welders have come from is irrelevant.
What you have to realise is that this is an international forum and that there are other codes other than ASME, AWS and API that are being used around the world.
The example I gave of a 3 man company, they may have been qualified to AS 3992 ( Australian pressure piping) and BS/EN 287
( British/European pressure piping) but Bechtel come to town and they require ASME procedures.
What do you do, spend thousands for one job and then when Bechtel have left town you have to go back to the procedures that are recognised by the local authorities.
I used to do PQR's in New Zealand and have them qualified to 4 different codes (ASME/AS/NZ/BSEN) Talk about a pain in the ass,
REgards,
Shane
Shane
I am of the same opinion as you are regarding the use and control of WPS's and their ownership.
In saying this, I understand that in order to "own" a WPS the qualification needs to be done to ensure the competence (both technically and physically) of the company to perform the specific weld.
Do you have any reference to specifics outlined in welding codes AWS / EN ISO / API etc. that covers this?
Shane, I may have answered a bit hastily.
KGV's question was: Would a company be allowed to weld using another companies WPS with their permission. ANSWER: NO.
(continued) Company A has sent their WPS to company B to repair equipment that belongs to Company A.
(continued) Company B has welders qualified to materials, thicknesses, process and consumables that is required to weld to the WPS
Company A may subcontract the services of Company B and the welder's of Company B may use the welding procedures of Company A so long as those welders are completely under the supervision of Company A. Put simply, if Company B is willing to give Company A hire/fire authority over its welders in such a way that the welders of Company B are really seconded employee's of Company A, then the answer would be "Yes."
I know this is confusing, have a look at QW-100.1 and QW-201 to see if it makes more sense?