Hello Garry,

Welcome to the forum. You've got several questions in this post, the members of the forum will have varying opinions but most are not shy about giving them, so here goes mine.

No you do not have to be a welder to be a weld inspector by code. Taking the CWI for instance, the cwi is susposed to have 5 years experience, either in welding or inspection, and can be a mix of the two as well. ASNT SNT-TC-1A does not require welding experience, nor does EN 473, ISO 1072, JS NDI z2305, or any other national or international certification scheme that I am aware of. They do require specific training in inspection, but not welding experience. In this instance your engineer is correct.
Having said that; it is very benificial to have learned how to weld, or learn how to weld for a welding inspector. I came up in the inspection side, and for that same reason, have taken welding courses, and practice at home, but I am an inspector by trade.

As for the WPS, I would have to differ with your engineer in regards to the "ease of preperation", especially when it comes to the pqr.
wps software is only as accurate as the input given, and therefore prone to error. It is always better to know how to write it without crutches. If you do a search on this forum, you will see were many of the long time weld engineers and welders from time to time have problems in this area, Therefore even for the best of the best, there are sometimes challenges in writing a functional pqr/wps.
Copying a wps from a previous project, with the same same criteria is easy, it's when that process/wps goes south and doesn't work that it requires specific knowledge, skill, and education to sort out the problem, and get back into production.

If you want to understand the codes, get a copy of them and study them in detail and in particular pay attention to what is mandatory, and what is commentary. Many times the intent of a given code is found in the commentary.

As for lack of a QA/QC department, it will only take one lawsuit because your contractor wasn't monitored and used the wrong material/process/method etc and the vessel sinks in service for that to change. If the company survives the suit financially, it will cost them dearly. Your statement about engineers who don't know what codes are being used, and leaving it up to the contractor is disturbing. If in fact they are engineers, subcontracting the work, they should as a mimimum know what code they are building to even if it's contract labor. For all they know the contractor could be using farmcode 2002.

My opinion for what it's worth,
Gerald

I certainly agree with Gerald and the others.

I remember when I first started doing WPS that I was taught to use existing WPS as a guide and to learn what the parameters meant and how they related.  I didn't understand what the big deal was and why I couldn't just cut and paste.  Now, that I'm a little wiser and have had some practical experience welding I realize what a dis-service just copying a WPS blindly can do.  You essentially put the people using that WPS in a corner.  The equipment they can use, their skill level, potentially their health and productivity are all affected by that single document....  We haven't even considered special project requirements or applications like notch toughness... 

There was an article I found that I used to use with my summer students to get them started writing WPS titled, "What Every Welding Engineer Should Know about Procedures".  Look it up on the AWS site, it may be of some help.

As for the lack of QA / QC in shipbuilding, I don't imagine they will be building ships or other vessels for a long time.  If the classification societies, such as Lloyd's, DNV, ABS, GL, etc. don't make them change then the market will.  I recently finished a couple of small jobs on aluminum boats where the type of attitude you describe is evident.  The welding looked poor, there appeared to be surface defects in the base material and to top it off the cracking in the hull suggested the "engineer" forgot about the beating vessels take while at sea.   Now it looks like the hull will have to be replaced and the vessel is less than 2 months old!   The new owner I'm sure was not impressed.  Organizations that choose to ignore quality and productivity will not be around for very long, because there are a lot of customers that do care and will pay the extra money for the extra bit of diligence and traceability.

Sean

I do not agree with the statement that you do not need to be a welder to be a welding inspector. But thats the way it is, any inspectors that I have met though that have taken ther time to learn it or have worked their way through the trade are far more effective then those that have not. If you do not know how to pick the variables etc required to write a procedure as a welding inspector you shouldn't be doing that kind of work the guy that says he copied it off the last set of drawings is proof of that point. Haveing built a number of boats myself it is sad to say that the yacht industry is full of guys that do not want to pre-qaulify their welds or procedures on account of they say it cost to much money and there isn't enough in it to make it worth while. Having seen a nomber of cracked and porosity filled welds it makes you wonder how they get away with it. If it where me I wouldn't spend a dime on a boat that can't be tracked by the paper work and the personel to back it up. It's buyer beware and how sad is that. 

Been in and out so will just say have a good new years all.

Regards,
Gerald