Yep

They are very cool,,, but very spendy.

The only folks who have them are Prisons, colleges and the military... People who have the taxpayers provide the funding.

I saw that awhile back while doing some reading, magazine or internet. They said it was better than the traditional way because you were not wasting consumables, metals etc. I just wonder how acurate it is after you've trained on it and then they lay out a real piece of pipe for you to test on? Pretty neat tech but not as good as the real thing in my opinion. Like you said Bryon, "used early in one's welding education" get the idea of the motions then start burning the real rod.