Saw a total rookie move at the Port of Detroit last week

I was down at the Port of Detroit last Thursday doing a walkthrough on a job bid. Watched this younger guy try to tack a boiler plate without preheating the edges in 30 degree weather. Foreman came over and reamed him out for a solid 5 minutes before showing him how to do it right with a rosebud torch. Has anyone else seen new guys skip basic steps like that on a cold day?

3 comments

3 Comments

jadew6312d ago

Man, that whole thing sounds like a mess but it reminds me of something I saw a few years back. There was this guy on a crew I was working with who spent a whole afternoon grinding down a weld only to realize he had the wrong rod for the base metal. He was so focused on the prep work he forgot to check the actual materials. The foreman just stared at him for a minute then walked away without saying anything. That silence was worse than getting yelled at for five minutes. Sometimes the best thing you can do is just let someone figure out they messed up on their own.

drew_park12d agoTop Commenter

Whoa, hold on a second. I gotta push back on this a little. Yeah, preheating is important in cold weather, but calling it a "rookie move" is kind of harsh. That kid might have just been following the written specs or the procedure he learned in school, not realizing the foreman wanted a different method for that specific job. I've seen old timers skip preheating on warm days and still get perfect welds because they adjusted their technique. Every situation is different, and sometimes you gotta just get the torch out and see what the metal actually does before you start heating it up. The foreman yelling at him for five minutes didn't teach him anything useful, it just made him scared to ask questions next time.

emmaj3312d ago

Yeah you kinda nailed it actually. I used to be on the side of the old timers who'd say preheating is preheating and if you skip it you're just being lazy. But watching that foreman lose his cool for five minutes straight definitely changed my mind. That kid probably won't ask for help next time he's unsure, he'll just guess and hope it works out. Yelling at people for following the textbook doesn't make them better welders, it just makes them scared to ask.