Hey everyone, i just joined the forum about 5 seconds ago. I figured this would be a great place to get some advice on some upcoming decisions that are going to be made. I have been looking at every site out their and reading all of the material on underwater welding and the whole process that goes along with it. I'm very determined to make this my career and am just looking for a nudge in the right direction. I'm graduating high school in june and have had the question. "now what" on my mind alot lately. Any feed back would be much appreciated- thanks, Tyler
Hello Tyler, WELCOME to the forum. There is another individual who was asking about underwater welding on another thread at this same time. My first suggestion is this, the forum has a feature that is called a "search", it is located in plain view on the tool bar above the postings and threads at almost all times, I believe. Click on this search function and type in "underwater welding" or any other similar heading, likely there will be number of choices for selection that will come up. Take some time to read and research through as many of these as you can stand. There are questions and answers covering a number of topics and associated questions that you should probably consider as you look to go into this field. Conditions, work, wages, safety, how to go about getting started, things that you can expect, a host of other items are discussed at length and with great honesty. If you have some questions try to be specific when you ask, there are a number of individuals that can answer these questions as many of those who are in the trade are also active participants on the forum. Good luck, I hope your questions are answered and wish you great success as you start down this road. Regards, aevald
My buddy back home in Alaska joined the piledrivers union and went to school to learn underwater welding. He brought home a six digit paycheck every three months. The only thing about underwater welding is there isn't longevity in it. The average diver only gets a good 5 years in before his body wont handle it anymore. A couple times with the bends and you're done......
Then what?
There are other health concerns besides the bends associated with spending a lot of time under water, one involves bone problems. Some friends of mine have a son in His mid-late 40s suffering from it now.
This type of welding (and inspection) is for a special breed. Swimming around in pitch black with things bumping into you, sometimes large things and having no idea what it is, is not my cup of tea. My hats off to the folks who do this for a living.
tyler, I have spent in excess of 20 years in the diving industry, So the first question you have to answer for yourself is do you have a passion for this kind of work. Mostly guys will go out and spend a whole wack of money to go to commercial diving school because some one told them they can make a six figure salary travel the world and chicks dig'm. You can infact make a good living at diving but it's along road to get there most guys give up long before they ever see any real money, Divers are listed in the phone book between distleries and divorce so chicks don't really dig'm that much. you will have to travel all the time as the work is seldom in your back yard. if you are as determined as you say you are be sure to pick a school that offers international certification there are only two that I know of in the states any thing else will be a waste of your money. Aswell the best thing you can do if you plan on making welding your specailty is first learn the trade and get as many certs as you can before you go to diving school, one you will have a shorter learning curve for wet welding you will be able to qualify for dry hyberbaric welding, and most importantly it will give you something to fall back on when you are trying to break in to the industry. It is not all doom but as a side note I went to school with 27 guys in the class we graduated with 17 of which only 4 broke in to the business of which 2 are dead, one is injured and myself whom by the skin of my teeth have managed to survive reatively intacked with only a few broken bones and the odd set of stiches.the job can be boring at times broken up with a few minutes of terror just to keep you on your toes. Do not expect to be making a six fiqure income right out of school in fact at times the pay will seem hardly worth the effort. But if you can get through that it can be alot of fun. There are alot of bubble blowers out there so do yourself a favour and learn your trade. Dive Safe.
Tyler,
Makeithot is right and I whole heartly agree with him, I've been doing the commercial diving thing for 10 years now. Learned to weld underwater with the company that I work for and have been doing that since I started this business. Most of the guys that I know/have known like makeithot said, divorced or a distlery. From the view point of being the instructor of underwater welding classes, the guys that come out here with the most certs or the topside welding experience tend to have a more difficult time learning the underwater portion, but there are exceptions to the rule. With that said it isn't for the faint of heart, over the last 10 years I've seen more people that didn't make than did. If you want to do wet welding in the Gulf of Mexico there's only a couple of compaines that do that sort of business, there are several inland companies also. As far as wet welding offshore, some years you will do a lot and then there's sometimes you won't weld for a year or two. Welding is just considered a speciality you will be mainly a construction diver. Sometimes it's fun sometimes, you wonder why you pick this type of career, but in the end you get to do something that few others can, will or able to do.
Charles Welch
P.S. Makeithot, do you know a M. Oetelaar?
No I do not know him, and "they have a more difficult time" In my experience because they do not know where to look in order to see the puddle, once you teach'm that ,they can then learn how to do it in the dark and will far surpass the average diver and will further more be employed fixing stuff that other divers have broken," Break one,loose one,eat one" one of the many rules divers live by.
Another fellow I met started as an auto mechanic and recreational diver. He went to dive school, learned welding and the whole bit. After working underwater for a few years He hired on to the maintainance crew at a nuke powerplant. Not all the work was wet, but it all involved wearing a pressure suit. This is another related field, with it's own set of issues.
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