I'm looking at taking a welding class this fall at the local college. They offer a few choices:

WELD A101-Gas and Arc Welding: Introduces basic principles of welding. Covers Oxy- acetylene welding, brazing, silver soldering and oxy- acetylene flame cutting in the first half of the course. Covers shielded metal arc welding the second.

WELD A112-Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW): Introduces the welding of high strength steels with covered electrodes. Includes welding safety, low hydrogen electrodes selection process, high strength welding joint design, and welding practice on alloyed steels with low hydrogen and alloyed electrodes.

WELD A114-Welding of High Strength Steels: Introduces the welding of high strength steels with covered electrodes. Includes welding safety, low hydrogen electrodes selection process, high strength welding joint design, and welding practice on alloyed steels with low hydrogen and alloyed electrodes.

WELD A161-Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW): Introduces gas metal arc welding techniques for joining a number of metals. Includes information on power supplies, wire feed equipment, shielding gases, filler metal selection, and electrical characteristics of the arc.

Flux Cored Welding (FCAW): Theory and practice of cored arc welding using self-shielded and dual shielded wire processes. Covers physics of welding transfer, electrical characteristics of power supplies, wire feeders, and filler metal selection. Presents welding in accordance with the American Welding Society structural welding code.

Also the local college offer some fabricating classes:

WELD A190-Welding Fabrication and Manufacturing: Provides relevant topics and skills enhancement in the field of welding and fabrication for manufactured products.

WELD A287-Welding Metallurgy Applications: Presents technical information in welding metallurgy. Includes laboratory practice in metallography, heat-treating, and mechanical properties testing.

What would you guys/gals suggest for a newbie welder/fabricator? I did take metal shop in the 11th grade. We did a semester of welding. First half was Oxy-acetylene welding/cutting. The second half was Arc/stick welding and used the spot welder a bit. I sort of know the proper technique, but I really didn't take the class very seriously. To busy screwing around and didn’t care at the time. BTW, it's been 6 years since high school, 7 since metal shop.:rolleyes:

BTW, the classes mentioned above are being offered this fall semester. University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA) offers a lot more too.

hmmm thats a hard call most of them sound good but ther is alot of overlap.



if your learning so you could work on your rig. Id go

"WELD A190-Welding Fabrication and Manufacturing: Provides relevant topics and skills enhancement in the field of welding and fabrication for manufactured products. "


but if doing this to realy get into serious welding go

"WELD A114-Welding of High Strength Steels: Introduces the welding of high strength steels with covered electrodes. Includes welding safety, low hydrogen electrodes selection process, high strength welding joint design, and welding practice on alloyed steels with low hydrogen and alloyed electrodes. "



just my .02

Take the A101 first and do some practice. If you get your "hands" back quickly, I bet the teacher will let you concentrate on what you want to really learn. Also, you can find out more about which class is beter for your second simester :)

If it were me, I do the 114 after completing the 101. Have fun. I'm taking my second simester this Fall. :D

well it depends on if yer gonana use the classes for job requirements or just to have the knowledge if yer gonna use it for knowledge id do the first one alot of most people do arch welding.

No this won't be for job knowledge/skills. I want to learn to fab/weld my own bumpers, do trail repairs, etc. You know hobby stuff.:D

take the intro and have some fun then talk to the teacher see what they say

What kind of welder do you have in the shop to work on you rig? If its a stick welder, I would do the A112 class.
If you have a mig welder(wire-feed), I would take the A161 class.
IMO mig would be the way to go for working on a rig in a shop.

The only welder I hve ever used is a 200 amp lincoln mig. I really enjoy this welder and it does a fine job.

Originally posted by toploader
What kind of welder do you have in the shop to work on you rig? If its a stick welder, I would do the A112 class.
If you have a mig welder(wire-feed), I would take the A161 class.
IMO mig would be the way to go for working on a rig in a shop.

Right now, I don't have any welder. I was thinking of taking Arc/stick because if I can master arc, mig will be easy.

Originally posted by pyros46290
take the intro and have some fun then talk to the teacher see what they say

You mean the 101 right? I would actually like to learn how to braze too.

OT-At one time I had a crazy notion of building a refrigeration unit to cool my comp. All HVAC/R copper tubing joints must be silver soldered/brazed.

Well I guess I aswered my own question!:flipoff2: Thank for the input though!

Originally posted by Overlord


Right now, I don't have any welder. I was thinking of taking Arc/stick because if I can master arc, mig will be easy.
EXACTLY;)

Start at the beggingin (101.) it covers cutting and all basic welding. i think the main difference between welders that really know the shit and those that dont is the number hours doing it. im not as good as i want to be but the more i weld the better i get. also unless your a good cuttter i think that it would be a good op to hone your skills. too many booty fabbers spend too much tiem grinding their cuts because they were sloppy with the O/A torch (i was one of them until i watched grandpa in law cut what looked machine precision with little ot no slag gumming the edges up.)

I was thinking of taking Arc/stick because if I can master arc, mig will be easy.

i have found this to b true. i was stick welder first then mig. but i think it could also work the other way around as well.

have fun! looks like youll learn alot in any course you decide to take.

welding classes usually have A101 (theory and basics) as a prerequisite


I was a decent welder in high school but I've only fired the mig 5 or so times since then

I am taking 101 this fall

i never welded in my life, took the basic SMAW class at the community college and built my whole rig, including the 4link. im currently enrolled in a trade school for welding, (FCAW, SMAW, GMAW, GTAW, blueprints, plasma and oxy-acel. cutting, etc.) welding is fun:D

Originally posted by Booger Weldz
i never welded in my life, took the basic SMAW class at the community college and built my whole rig, including the 4link. im currently enrolled in a trade school for welding, (FCAW, SMAW, GMAW, GTAW, blueprints, plasma and oxy-acel. cutting, etc.) welding is fun:D

Are you going to do it for a living or something?

Got signed up for the 70b (equal to the above 161) class for this Fall. My instructor is big on having projects and/or repairs to do. I can't wait!

when i took welding at my local community college i went in and told the teacher what my intentions were. i wasn't there to get a certificate but just to learn practical knowledge about welding and to get a good feel for it. i'm sure the teacher will be cool if you just lay down what you want to get out of his class.

I wish I had a similar class offering at my local university.

Ok if you know how to use a torch then skip the oxy class (when are you ever going to oxy weld). Do the stick and then take the mig. You will end up using the torch for some cutting of material to weld to so they will go over safety (good refresher is never bad). You will most likely do some stick welding for trail repair or for heavy material even if you have to borrow a machine and the mig is good for most everything you will be doing in the shop at home.
I would also suggest that you get the basics down and then start doing some out of position stuff as that is what the real world is full of.
HTH

Originally posted by Frankie_Bones
I wish I had a similar class offering at my local university.
I'm going to be calling the local schools around here tomorrow morning. This thread may just have inspired me. :flipoff2:

WELD A161-Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW): Introduces gas metal arc welding techniques for joining a number of metals. Includes information on power supplies, wire feed equipment, shielding gases, filler metal selection, and electrical characteristics of the arc.
mig and tig is your best friends when it comes to welding rigs