Testing your welds !!

[Bonzo]

Originally Posted by hyperbodger

Must say though I'm a bit surprised that there aren't some weld tests in the IVA for self builds given the current state of Health And Safety legislation.

I guess that the introduction of such a scheme would be unworkable.

A typical welders coding certificate will only be valid for 12 months, unless they are working in a Lloyds certified establishment, then your employer may be able to certify your work until it is time to renew them ( 3 yearly in my day & for my particular set codes )

Then there will be the training aspect of the IVA testers, doubtless that would lead to a huge increase in test fees.

To the trained eye, a good visual inspection will only serve to tell if something is obviously seriously wrong with a particular weld.
Porosity, undercut & poor fusion ( by looking at the heat affected zone ) to name a few.

A visual inspection is very limited once the weld has been subjected to a few layers of paint ( read more or less, worthless )

The last big company I worked for had over 20 welders working on industrial chassis manufacturing amongst other things.
The vast majority of these welders had had no formal training or ever held the most Basic BS4872 coding.
Dragged into a welding booth from other parts of the factory & given a few days training form a more senior welder ( Ironically, one that had never had any formal training )

This seems to be quite normal in the general fabrication industry.

My advice, plenty of practice, plenty of destructive testing & it will soon be second nature to know when a weld is good