Most of the work I get involved with is "one-of-a-kind,” so temporary braces are usually used. I like your setup because it minimizes the chance for errors.

I always say that a maintenance welder has to be smarter than your average production welder. The maintenance welder has to have a sense of forensics to determine why the part failed and then figure out if there is a way to ensure it does not break again. All of which has to happen on the job, in as short a time as possible, and usually without the assistance of an engineer.

The challenges of maintenance type welding are what make our work so interesting. It is one of the few areas in the working world where a person with initiative and pride in their work can excel. Welding is still dependent of an individual’s skill, talent, and intellect. Much of the repair work fits in the category of one-of-a-kind. Each new job has new challenges that call on the welder’s experience and knowledge of basic engineering and design to develop a viable solution to a problem.

The nature of my work involves clients that do not want their competition or customers to know what problems are affecting their production capabilities. Confidentiality is the by-word. I wanted to write an article for the Welding Journal about a job I did in January, but my client squelched that idea in terms that made it clear that that could not happen. My clients said they would skin me alive if they ever saw a photograph or mention of the company in print. 

I can tell you that the plans for the repair took me fours days to develop (analysis, design, WPS, sequence of repair, etc.) and it took 20 welders and 15 support people 15-days to complete. Of that 15-days, several were utilized to ramp up, i.e., line up a contractor, bring in equipment, obtain material, etc. As luck would have it, it was a long holiday weekend making it more difficult to contact people or suppliers.

We deposited about 3000 pounds of weld and used about 8000 pounds of one-inch plate. While the repairs were underway, it took an engineering firm, using finite element analysis, four more days to validate my design. They came up with four alternate designs, but my design was the only one that met all the constraints for longevity, cost, and time to complete. Even while the repairs were underway, they kept looking at alternative designs that would reduce the time to get the machine back on line. Each day of down time resulted in a loss of about million-dollars of revenue, hence the urgency to get the machine back on line as soon as possible. My design prevailed.

“See mom, all that time behind the welding hood and school finally paid off!”

Best regards - Al