breaking into welding (pipelining)

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-11-2008 06:32

ofcourse you can make anything work for ya, a couple cabinets , a place for your bottles and some wraps

By raftergwelding (*****)

Date 01-11-2008 11:46

search pawn shops for: torches, gauges,sledge hammers,hoses are best bought new,2 hole pins, templates bevel machines hammers, wrenches, wow the list is long the way i see it if you think you'll need it eventually 1 day you will. jack stands at least 4 but 8 is better any bed will work you can tweek it as you go if u buy everything new at once especially these days you'll need to rob a bank

By makeithot (***)

Date 01-11-2008 20:49

Among all the other sundry items one will need a varity clamps - vise grip clamps, vise grip pliers,betsy clamps c-clamps,pipe clamps oh and did I mention clamps. you can never have to many. Walk through a couple of welding stores and see what they have then go to your local flee market and do some shopping there. As an example I needed some more chain vise grips the other day $43.00 each ,flee market exact same item $5.00 each.

By JTMcC

Date 01-11-2008 23:48

This poor guy is getting some bad information, the same thing is happening over on the thread where people are telling some dude he needs commercial liability insurance to be a pipeline welder. Not in the United States.

Same with all of these tools, not in the United States.
In the U.S. a union pipeline welder has to furnish this and nothing more: welding hood, gloves, truck with a suitable welding machine, welding leads, oxy/acy gages hoses and a hand torch. That's it. Everything else is supplied by the contractor. Guys accumulate a lot of small tools over the years but that's all that's required.
In the non union sector they expect the welder to furnish some more tools, but not much more. Most non union welders carry a small beveling machine.

JTMcC.

on edit: welders do furnish pipe jacks in the non union sector as well.

By thebandit501 (*)

Date 01-12-2008 01:17

Thanks for the advice I am going to start cruising pawn shops and other places that sell that sort of stuff. But I need some opionions on welding machines I like the miller trailblazer 302 but the lincoln 305 G is starting to look good but I don't know, I don't even know if these welder would be suitable for pipelining

By dbigkahunna (****)

Date 01-12-2008 03:08

IF you are going to pipeline, to start out find a good used SA 200. Dont worry about red face, copper wound etc. Just get on that runs good. Most pipeliners can help you to keep it running until you can get somethin else, either newer or better. Good ones run 2500-4000. LEss than new and many a pipeliner has had a single unit for years. They make the welder money. THere are better welding machines, but none that will match the old SA 200 for day in day out reliability. Plus when you need a day off, you have to get the timing on your mag checked.
BABRT's

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-12-2008 03:17

i have welded .125 wall 3 mainline with my 305g , lease tieins . They are a decent little all round machine, and i wouldnt be afraid to pipeline with one and they are really light but hard on fuel. But i dont know ifthey are a better pipeling machine than an sa200 but for around 4 grand you will have a brand new machine on you rig

By thebandit501 (*)

Date 01-12-2008 18:46

true I guess I overlooked the good old SA 200 I know several people that has one it has never let them down I probaly will try to find one I know some farmers around my home town that are trying to sell theirs, they bought them new and just used them on the farm so they probaly dont have many hours, most of them run good but the paint is a little faded guess paint doesn't really matter. I live in oklahoma is there a place that rebuilds welding machine or at least can check them out?

By dbigkahunna (****)

Date 01-12-2008 19:40

If you show up on a pipeline job with a aircooled gasoline engine, you probable wont get to test. While some of the 20-22 HP gas engines will carry a 3, doing it all day 10 hours a day 6 days a week, the aircooled's just do not hold up. Even with the boom there are SA 200's going for $2500. Around Tulsa you should be able to find one pretty easily. I will be the first to say there are much better welding machines available. But when it comes to pipelining, everyone knows the SA, the contractors you work for know their reliability and they will make you money. I have seen SA's blowing 2 quarts of oil a day, studdering like Mel Tillis and blowing sparks out the stack 2 feet in the air run for weeks at a time.
BABRT's

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-13-2008 03:31 Edited 01-13-2008 03:43

so even on small lines you guys have to test down there before going? Up here you pull up on job ( kickoff) and no matter what you are doing (cap, hotpass, beads) you weld out (bead,hot,cap) the first joint in series (beadhand, then hotpass, then cappers) then the xray pulls up shoots then you are good to go. This isnt on every job , smaller (3 kms) of 3" or 4" or 6" . Bigger jobs (300 klicks of 24 or 36 you usually test before the job. Now i can only speak for up in canada so not arguing about what goes down in the states but i logged alot of clicks mainlining in AB. with my 305g and never a problem, i do agree i would feel alittle weird pulling up on a big spread doing 200 clicks of 36" with it but these machines have no problem stayin up with SA 200's . look at the picture of this beadhand and his resume and look at the machine in the back his truck http://www.owsc.ca/pwscInstructors.html

Like i said im not argueing your point on what will fly in the states when you show up to test. But maybe inspectors should start looking at these machines differently. I also say they arent the best machine but they definately work

By JTMcC

Date 01-13-2008 04:28 Edited 01-13-2008 04:37

Yes, every job means a test.
And you won't get a test with an air cooled machine.
We don't build many little pipelines. The majority of the lines being laid here now are 42". We have thousands of miles of 42" in the works, pipe mills are running full tilt and new ones are being built.
16" would be considered a small pipeline in the U.S.
Beads and hot passes are generally run off tack rigs, not welding rigs here.

JTMcC.

And your test papers are usually only good for 6 months, sometimes 12, depending on the gas company.

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-13-2008 05:12

Ah ok that makes sense then. Run off tack rig is that an automatic? we call automatics bugs and most big lines are bug welded atleast the bead. some of these lines have become totally automatic except tie ins but they call for rig welders for some lines. Most of these jobs run through the UA 488 pipeline board and through Ledcor and the Flint. A couple years ago when nat. gas was up we were layn these small inch lines constantly (tieing in gas wells) but now alot of the outfits that were really busy with those contracts are sitting pretty dormant. Most of the oil from oilwells are trucked to batteries so there is still a fair bit of facility work (b. 31 piping) and but it wasnt like it was in 2005 back then you didnt even have to barely look for work just drive your truck around a busy field and someone would pick you up. But even oil has been declining up here as far as conventional drilling and with a new oil royalties in place i9t's hard to tell how things will be by next year. There is alot of oilsands work but a good portion is by hand and modular construction done in shops then transported up to Ft. Mac.

Again JTMcC thank you for the info

By JTMcC

Date 01-13-2008 15:15

No a tack rig is a tractor with welding machines on it and a boom with a shade canopy that extends out over the weld.
The welding leads, remotes and grinders are all hanging off the boom so the welders just walk up, grab the stinger and run a bead (or hot pass), hang the stinger up and walk to the next one.
On very small jobs the front end will work off of welding rigs, but never in full blown production.

JTMcC.

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-17-2008 00:34

hi again JTMcC

so the other day i had a problem with this remote and i had it with this electronic crap so now im on days off and im gettin a dc gen machine in the next couple days so here's what ive narrowed down to RED D ARC D300K (300 amp lincoln with kabota stipped down no idler controls) not very happy with red d arc sales though they want $6800, for welder with 5800 hrs onit refurbed, i ask for build sheet and load bank on refurb and they say they don't do that and wont even throw a remote in with it (the only thing they can prove is that they painted the crap out of everything so now i can't even get good look at engine seals or injector leaks so im not to interested in dealing with these guys..... brand new Lincoln 3d $11,800 perkins- $12,300(with kabota or perkins im leanin with kabota for rpm control but perkins is way friendlier with warranty im told by the saleman but no rpm control yet) or there is clean classic 2 on consignment with remote for about $5500 with decent hours new brushes and a few other maint thing done to it. Whats your oppinion? IM stuck between the 3 and i know we talked about this earlier but i got to try to make a decision in the next couple days, ill need a day to fit it on my skid. Anybody else have an oppinion ?please chime in

By downhandonly (***)

Date 01-17-2008 00:56

my sa 200 broke down last winter on a 30" line up north (crank seal) and the company I was working for fixed me up with a reddarc 300 I found it wouldnt stack very good but one day there was something wrong with the tranny on the poorboy tack rig so me and another guy ran beads for the rest of the day and it had tons of jam (hence the poor stacking). I also used it to hot-fill with no problems. P.S. I know lots of guys who run those little "red rockets" on big inch but I wouldn't feel right with one on my truck.

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-17-2008 01:20

i found the guy's at reddarc kinda ignorant but my buddy up in wabasca runnin his and loves it ( but he dont mainline) said he picked up his from them with 4400 hrs for $4000 i know they werent interested in giving me a deal like that. What do you think of the new 3d? you like the rpm adjuster on your 200?

By downhandonly (***)

Date 01-17-2008 02:27

I really like it so far. turn it down to stack turn it up to bead. beats jamming a quarter in the governer on my sa 200. the only thing I've noticed is that the engine runs really cold, even fabbing it barely hits 150. A friend of mine has a 300d with the kubota and his is coldblooded as well.

By JTMcC

Date 01-19-2008 02:25

So JescoPressure, what did you buy???????

JTMcC

By JescoPressure (**)

Date 01-19-2008 03:48

Well when i bought my last machine ( 305 g ) i went with a company called lease link to buy it and i i signed a 3 yr lease with a buyout of 500$ at the end so i still owed 9 months on that lease so before i bought the new one i wanted to pay out the lease on this one and possibly do the same deal again so when all said and done i paid 7200$ for this 305 G (WHOA!) . But when i bought it i had just broke out 6 months before that and the sa 200 i had (78 worn out and put away wet) was causin me to lose work by giving me problems in the middle of the job so i had to take a bad lease rate to get that one. Now my business credit is alot better he called me back today and said he could cut my lease rate down to a 1/4 of what i did on the 305g but i picked up a couple days work in town so i wouldnt be able to mount it before taking off back to wabasca so i put a couple grand on the Kabota 3d and im gonna humm it over for a couple weeks whether to pay out cash or lease again. My book keeper is going to look at which would work best for me ( probably lease again) but its pretty much done deal on the 3d.

Thanks JTMcC and Downhand for the help deciding

By downhandonly (***)

Date 01-17-2008 01:04

P.S. I had a 300d lincoln for a couple years (traded a miller pipepro for it) and couldn't set it up to weld how I wanted. So far I'm happy with my 200d.

By pipeliner01 (**)

Date 01-19-2008 05:55

well. I guess I'm a little late on this thread but, every 300D I've laid my grubhooks on has been an awful headache for me, I know several fellas (downhandonly included) we all had these machines and subsequently got rid of them, cause they wouldn't stack. I've "tag teamed" joints off one machine with other guys and what a difference, my repair guy had a few sensible answers for this lack of stacking, that's another story. I also heard that some of the first vantages also sucked at pipelineing. I think downhandonly probably has the best idea, (pipeliner 200D)full size machine=LOTS of power for anything, adjustable idle for mainline welding and diesel engine for longevity and fuel economy, although the weight and price suck compared to a 305, I'd bet the farm on a better return on your investment. But, until the patch picks up round' here I'll still roll w/ my 56' stubby (shorthood).

By downhandonly (***)

Date 01-19-2008 23:20

just to be clear mine was the Perkins.

By texasrigwelder (**)

Date 01-20-2008 00:07

man the 300 with a perkins will stack like crazy if u turn the R's down, ive welded with one that i put the biggest pretties humped up cap ive ever made, i dont like em though cause they seem to cold to me

By pipeliner01 (**)

Date 01-20-2008 20:21

sorry, I should have clarified

By JTMcC

Date 01-17-2008 02:24

Man that's a conundrum. I'd have to factor in the work outlook over the next few years. If I was confident in a solid workload I'd go for the new 300D Kubota. If not I'd go for the CII. Personally I'd pass on the red-d-arc.
$12k is a chunk but if you think about it, 3 to 5 weeks gross income and it's paid for.
People always ask me what that machine on my truck cost, I steal a line from an old pile driver and tell them it doesn't cost money, it makes money ; )

I'm leaving in about an hour for a small job so good luck either way.

JTMcC.

By DONKEY PUNCH Date 01-13-2008 02:33

jtmc is right start with solid machine buy all ur tax rightoffs when u need2

By darren

Date 01-13-2008 10:40

this site shortens the search for anything you want to buy
http://www.likeits1999.com/

By BigRed

Date 01-17-2008 06:29

Jesco, I bought a 300D/kubota a little over a year ago and have been very happy with it. Runs for about three days on a tank. I don't play with the rpm adjustment much, just leave it on max. It starts well in the cold too.
Tom