Giovanni, they are everywhere. Not the ones in the movies but the ones that show up on jobs and do subpar work. There are many reasons for this.
Companies do not have enough quality help and supervisors but still take on the jobs with people that are not fully qualified to fulfill their contracts. Not enough young people coming up in the trades, owners using illegal help trying to save a few dollars, so much work in the USA many start up companies that otherwise would not be able to get in or stay in business, contracts do not allow money for a special inspector to be on site everyday they call them when they need them, etc.
Every year we get calls like the one described by EXPERTFAB. We are on two jobs like that now. The GC will not let the erectors back to clean their mess up. Many times the CWI will not let them back on site to weld having visually rejected the whole job (they still let them hang iron and bolt up)
Sometimes it is calls to fix stairs and rails(misc. metals), occasionally it is pipe jobs but not that often. Scope of work sometimes last for several weeks.
When I moved from the power plant industry to the commercial (schools, colleges, municipal buildings, hospitals, etc.) I was rudely awakened to a world of subpar work that goes on. I wish it didn't. The true craftsmen and contractors that do it right would get more money for their efforts. I have to tell our guys from time to time that just because "they" get by doing it that way does not mean we will do it that way. It's hard to financially compete with companies that use "cowboys". I'm sure that there will always be a place for the "fixers"
BTW- As I understand the use of the term cowboys in this way it is workers that are jack of all trades but master of none.
No offense intended to any cowboys out there.
Didn't mean to turn this into a rant.
"Cowboy!" A general descriptive term as used in the inspection industry. It is fortunate for me that one of my best friends is in fact a real life honst to goodness cowboy whom makes his living doing real cowboy work. He readily describes work in his own trade performed subpar as "a bunch of cowboys" when denoting the lack the skills, knowledge or finesse to be good at what they do. Confusing to say the least, when your actual job title is often substituted for a demeaning descriptor. But that is the way it is out here in Colorado where the real cowboys and the wanna-be types collide. It is with his blessing and my utmost respect for his profession that I borrow for my use the term "Cowboy" for use in describing a demeanor that results in subpar results. I have spent a few days "in his saddle" so to speak trying my best to do what real cowboys do. I think I just stick to the iron trades as that real life cowboy stuff is really hard.
Good for all of that the phrase "just a bunch of welders" never became vogue as a negative slur. Funny,as I think about it; there must be inate respect for welders as a whole by those whom value their teeth. Seems as those that maintain a full set of pearly whites have very little negative to say.
How pleasant were those cowboys movies! John Wayne, Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, the Lonely Ranger, Tim Mc Coy, the saloon, the indians (always led by Geronimo, their chief), the guns whose bullets never ended, the good guy always won, the bad guys were always defeated and the indians were always killed by the dozen (you can't make a movie nowadays were indians are killed. Nowadays' movies are Equal Opportunity or, if you prefer, Affirmative Action).
The frequentors of this site who are over 60 will remember those good old days of our childhood.
Giovanni S. Crisi
Giovanni-
At one time or another free range ranching was common from the Mexican border (and into Mexico) to the Canadian border and beyond and from just beyond the Mississippi to the foothills of the Rocky mountains.
I also enjoyed those old movies (bad guys always had black hats, good guys white). I also enjoyed story telling on the radio, the Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers,and more and science fiction, Dimension X, the Twilight Zone, and others. The great thing about the radio stories was that you set the scene in your imagination, so complex scenes which would require impossible special effects to creat in a viewable medium were not a problem.
There have been some pretty good movies with native americans depicted in a more neutral way also- Cheyenne Autumn, A Man Called Horse, Jerimiah Johnson, Dances With Wolves, are some I have enjoyed.
Bill
Jesse James was from Missouri.
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