Hi All!I'm posting here from Bill Kurtis Productions and The History Channel-go easy on me, guys!I'm currently developing a new series for The History Channel that will focus on Underwater Contractors/ Welders, think "The Deadliest Catch," or "Ice Road Truckers". History Channel came to us and asked us to create a series on individuals that deserve to be highlighted for all their, (often unrecognized) hard work. I couldn't think of a better type of industry to document!Since I'm new to all this, I was wondering if y'all could help me out. I'm looking for teams, stories, people that currently work in underwater welding/contracting, and basically to learn more about the trade. It's such an extremely important skill and business and so many people in both the US, as well as foreign countries, don't know enough about all the hard work you do out there. We've got some pretty gutsy camera and audio guys-but they don't come close to being as brave as you all are-and, honestly, important-haha!Anyway, I'd really like to highlight teams/companies/individuals on this new series and I figured this was the best place to start!!I'd really love to talk to anyone of you all, so maybe I could explain more of what I'm developing!Shoot me an email....
[email protected] forward to hearing from you all!!!
Reply:Have you contacted any of the underwater welding schools in the USA? I'm certain they would love the publicity. Some of their facilities and training programs might be worth including in your show. They would have great contacts with the companies who are doing underwater welding on a daily basis.Benson's Mobile Welding - Dayton, OH metro area - AWS Certified Welding Inspector
Reply:I think a show on welding in general would be great!!! I don't know if you would want to focus it on underwater welding though. There are so many different forms of welding, different material to weld and different ways to weld them. With the huge shortage of welders that there is, that might get people interested. The say that the age of the average welder is 55 year old, we're going to need a few more people in this industry in a few more years. Please reply back if you have any more questions.MikeGo hot, or go home!
Reply:Kate (I will assume),From your post it appears that you decided on underwater welding not the History Channel, is this correct? Since you refer to the shows "The Deadliest Catch," or "Ice Road Truckers" I will ask if your goal is to document how hazardous the job can be? If so, this could be a great topic.If you are looking for the unsung hero, the people that greatly shaped the country and did not get glorified for doing so, I think you are looking at the wrong job description.The reason is that there is really not that much underwater welding going on. It is dangerous and therefore they do as much as possible to avoid it. The make parts then go down and bolt them if possible. You can make it look like a lot goes on but I think you will be surprised at how hard companies avoid doing it.I am not a television writer, producer or reporter but hopefully that is not your target audience. I am a viewer and I would much rather see a show that highlights the skills and abilities of the true worker. I think that is why Dirty Jobs was such a popular show. Sure the Mike Rowe was funny but it showed real people making a difference in the world that others never think about. Welders in general have done this for many, many years. The only ones that get any publicity are the showboats like the guys on American Chopper but nobody shows that they just tack things together and have an old man welder do the real work off camera. Again hiding the real skill.I would like to see a series that has SMALL shops take on large or uncommon projects and see how they figure out how to get the job done and the difficulties doing so. They would have to make tools and create jigs and other things to help do the job. Maybe because they cannot afford the commercial tool or in a more likely case, there is NO tool out there that does what they need done. They would be calling in favors from friends to help out and eventually they would put out a product that meets the customers needs perfectly.I would not be interested in seeing a show like Junkyard Wars that want you to make an airplane and there happens to be a set of wings in the junkyard. This is not real fabrication to me.I am not impressed by the business that can do a little with a lot, I want to see the guy that can do a lot with a little.In my little 20'X20' shop I can make a lot of pretty cool things. Every visitor that sees things I have made almost always ask; "You made that?" They are totally shocked that something cool or useful can be made in a small backyard shop.There are guys here at this forum that can make amazing things with amazing skill the will outdo the larger shops with old equipment or equipment they sacrificed greatly to obtain. Compared to some of these people I feel totally inadequate in my skill set. These guys make their less than glamorous incomes by working their butts off every day for customers that don't [always] appreciate their skills and complain about their meager pricing. They don't have unions negotiating their income, no guaranteed paychecks, no hazardous pay, usually no health insurance and definitely no promise of work tomorrow.THAT IS WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE.Personally I would request that whatever you do, don't show some guys with perfect gear, in a perfect location and parts cut out by a different department on CNC machines from cad drawings and all they have to do is stick them together. I do not consider that welding, I consider that assembling. If every part was perfect and the environment was perfect and the equipment was perfect, welding would be a lot easier to do. It is the unexpected where a true welder, guys like those on this forum, shine. Trying to crawl inside of a machine and twist around and weld a part you can't actually touch and sometimes not even see is where skill and just plain good sense come in.As stated earlier, most of the welders are older and will be retiring in a few years. There is nothing out there to encourage the young to investigate welding as a career. A good series of the real, down and dirty welder that can think on his feet and make or repair damn near anything in all kinds of conditions, I suggest you look at some of the people on this forum and get an idea of how the REAL WORLD works and help get more young people interested in keeping it alive.Sorry for the soapbox time but I REALLY believe this is the way to go if you want to interest people enough to sit down and watch a show. You get a guy that knows something about welding, at least enough to ask the right questions, and have him do the story. Don't use an actor like Tom Cruise walking around acting like he has any remote idea what is going on, get a welder.The underwater welding, to me would be boring and here is why. The majority of the work is done above the water. The parts are made and welded together by a factory and loaded onto a ship full of a bunch of support personnel. Several guys using special equipment get the part down to the location and get it into place and secured for welding. Then a guy comes down and gets ready to weld it. He tells the guys topside to turn on the welder. They turn it on and he welds a couple inches and tells them to turn it off. They do. This is repeated as many times as needed and they all come up. Everything is done in increments due to safety and to me would be boring for a show.Please consider taking another path for your story. A lot more gets done above water than below.Please let us know what you do and if we can help. I may jump back on my soapbox but it is only because I believe that the small fab shops and the "one man show" welders are really keeping this country going and we need to attract new young people.Bob
Reply:Agree wholeheartedly with above post. As he said, if you produce the "do a little with a lot", the networks will have a looser. Since the pantry is cramed full of interesting skills, how come the Canadians seem to produce the best stuff? Too busy to say any more...hope you do it and good luck.
Reply:Hi All!Thanks so much for your help, guys!! Bob-you rock! Actually, you were pretty on point with what I'm looking for in a series. Have you seen Ax Men? It's the History Channel's new series about real men that do real work. It's dirty, it's dangerous, and it's the work that keeps the economy thriving. With so much outsourcing going on right now, I'm interested in bringing back the focus to American workers that lay the foundation for this country. That being said, I'm really not interested in the large shops with the perfect equipment. I'm interested in the guys that have been doing welding/salvage/repairs for years. They're the "real" people of this country, and I have a feeling that that would be far more interesting than a documentary on how "super high tech" companies work out there. Honestly, I'm not that interested in that-it seems so removed. So many people have suggested welders-I guess I thought by throwing in that underwater aspect, you build on a different layer of people that are really risking their lives for their job. As always, I'm working for the network-and risk, danger, excitement, and real people doing really tough jobs are what makes a series so appealing. Plus, it helps to highlight these wonderful men and women, and sparks a renewed interest in a very important field. It also doesn't hurt to get some massively free exposure for various companies on an national and international level. If you look at the guys from Ice Road Truckers-they're doing an incredible job that to be honest, I hadn't even known existed. Of course I look at wood at Home Depot, (I know, I live in Chicago, and lived in LA), and I didn't even think to realize all the hard work that goes into actually getting that lumber into the stores. Then I think about the bridges that we drive over ever day, the ships that are getting pulled out of the bottom of the ocean, the people who go down and recover planes, those who help out in times of crisis (a la Katrina), the people who keep this country running and that's where I came up with welders. I'm not looking to do any type of Hollywood show here. I don't think the American public is that interested in that faux reality any longer, (at least not the American public I appreciate), but rather, I'd like to highlight people that are out there working their butts off so that we can enjoy the comforts that we can right now.So, I'm not sure if that helps. I'm looking into small salvage/welding companies off the coast of Houston right now. Family run type deals. What do you all think??Any thoughts?
Reply:BEWARE, Soapbox area.I have already probably exceeded my .02 but will hop back on the box for a few minutes. See what happens when you ask a question here? Some guy like me actually jumps in and tries to tell you what to do. Actually I am not trying to tell you what to do, I am just passionate about what I consider to be an emergency in this country and that is the lack of skilled people that will be here in the future.All the machinists, welders, fabricators and quality woodworkers are going away. When they do, the skill goes with them. A perfect example of this is in knife making. The old method to make damascus has been lost because the young people were not interested in learning it. A superb piece of knowledge is lost, probably forever. Nobody knows how to do it today, NOBODY. There was an attempt to relearn how to make it but it was unsuccessful and an alternative was created to imitate damascus, it is called pattern welding and is done in a forge. The people that tried to relearn it are now mostly gone and those that are still alive are very old. I like some others learned how to pattern weld (imitate damascus like in the photo in my signature) but it will never be the same as the true thing. It is so important to relearn that museums have donated old swords and such to be destroyed in an attempt to relearn how to make it. So far, lots of antiques gone and no luck.I do not want to see the individual welders and the knowledge go away. The ability to "Think on your feet" is going the way of damascus steel. Kids now days don't know how to do anything and have no motivation to learn. You are in a position I would love to be in. You have the opportunity to influence an entire generation of people to go out and learn something that is integral to our country and the world. That is HUGE and I am very envious.Eventually all welding will be done by robots and they will only be able to build things, not repair them. Creating robots that can remove damaged parts and repair things will never happen, because each repair is different and each robot would require individual programming for each repair, way to expensive. Things will just be tossed out due to minor problems that cannot be overcome by robots. A $50 repair will result in something being trashed and a new $5000 item being created to replace it.If you are going for those that work in a crisis type of a show, you may be up for a decent show. Unfortunately in those situations it is usually more about destruction than assembly. In other words there are people down there cutting stuff apart to get to those in need. There was a whole lot of this done after September 11th, honorable for sure and would make a pretty good show. Unfortunately the restoration, the bridge building and such are usually the large companies with impersonal stories. Not what I would suggest (although it is not my decision).You could make your entire show off of this forum.You could go to member A's shop and follow him around for a week and see all the things he does and how much thinking is involved and how much skill is needed to do what he does and how versatile he must be to do it.Then you go to member B's place and see that he works in a small machine shop and a company brought in a part that is no longer made and this guy has to recreate that part exactly so it will work correctly on the machine it came from.Then Member C is tasked with creating a machine that will open and close a car door 5000 times to test the durability of the door mechanism. He has to create this machine out of thin air.Member D is on his way to repair some farm equipment that if it does not get repaired fast and correctly will mean the crops can't be harvested and sold. The farmer looses his butt.Member E is sitting in his small shop welding wheelchairs together for the wheelchair basketball team.Member F is building trailers for someone that wants to carry three motorcycles and a car. Trailer factories don't make them, they are CUSTOM.Member G is building clothesline posts for the state to install in its low income housing because people cannot afford dryers or the electricity to run them.Member H has a large piece of pipe that has worn down in diameter to a point that it no longer does its job. A welder takes that piece and welds around it multiple times to make it thick again and then machines it down to the proper diameter so that it can go back into service.I could go through the alphabet several times. THESE are the people that keep the country rolling. In my opinion these are the people that you should do your story on.You are looking a Houston, is that because of Katrina or is that close to you? All of the stuff I just highlighted above is happening in every state but below the radar. I am in Dallas and it happens here every day also. Exposing it could not only get young people interested, it could also let the public know that these people actually EARN every penny they make.Again, off my box.Thanks,Bob
Reply:Bob:Wow. So many damn good insights. Like: "Kids now days don't know how to do anything and have no motivation to learn." I couldn't agree more. Kids today don't want hard, satisfying work. They can't think, they have no problem solving skills. They don't have a clue how things got here. All they have is their 'entitlement' attitudes and 'I want everything now'. Weldors built the world as we know it; with the help of other Craftsmen. It's a shame we're loosing the Craftsman mentality that built America. You also mentioned: "The only ones that get any publicity are the showboats like the guys on American Chopper but nobody shows that they just tack things together and have an old man welder do the real work off camera. Again hiding the real skill."Although welding is my retirement hobby, I've always respected a weldors skills. I bought my O/A torch in 1977. A common misconception is: "Well that looks easy." Welding is really HARD. Unfortunately, no one knows it but another weldor. You mentioned weldors on this site "A thru Z". Hey, I know some of those guys. I agree with everything you said. Thanks for taking the time to say so much.CraigKate (using Bob's logic): Bob's passion is clearly evident. I'm impressed that he's able to express his ideas so well. He has given you much insight on what happens in many shops around the country. Call him; he could be our spokesman. I haven't been misspelling 'weldor'; the human. Welder is the box we use. For instance; "Don't drop the welder on the weldor". In print, it separates 'it' from 'us'.Speak up guys, here's your chance.Last edited by Craig in Denver; 05-06-2009 at 02:19 AM.Reason: Added 'Speak up guys'.9-11-2001......We Will Never ForgetRetired desk jockey. Hobby weldor with a little training. Craftsman O/A---Flat, Vert, Ovhd, Horz. Miller Syncrowave 250
Reply:Originally Posted by Craig in DenverI haven't been misspelling 'weldor'; the human. Welder is the box we use. For instance; "Don't drop the welder on the weldor". In print, it separates 'it' from 'us'..
Reply:Originally Posted by Craig in DenverI haven't been misspelling 'weldor'; the human. Welder is the box we use. For instance; "Don't drop the welder on the weldor". In print, it separates 'it' from 'us'.
Reply:The History Channel has some good shows, particularly Ax Men, Sand Hogs, and Ice Road Truckers. What I would hate to see is another show that focuses on how dangerous a career may be and so much drama is put into the first 45 minutes only to see something else happen the last 15 minutes. Ax Men is famous for this.There are literally hundreds of jobs going on at any given time anywhere in the country that a week's worth of filming could create several episodes I'm sure. Refineries, power plants, cement plants, etc. all undergo annual turn-arounds (overhaul or rebuild work) that employ weldors that would make for some dandy tv time.
Reply:These are some photos from post Katrina...I got them from a cousins website and this is as large as they come. Drilling rig was towed into Galveston for repair, last two photos are as completed.The Gulf Coast is a good place to start, Kate. There are many weldors operating along the coast repairing boats, ships, barges, working the oilfield in refineries, offshore (and onshore) production platforms, drilling rigs and myriad pipelines. I lived in the Houston-Pasadena area for 8 years, there's a couple of weldors there, too. Attached ImagesOnly when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realize we cannot eat money. -Cree Indian ProverbSA 200 LincolnVictor Torches
Reply:Here is a small salvage company, Kate, working out of Port Arthur, TX and Amelia, LA. Lots of PDF slideshows at this website, kind of give's you an idea of what's involved with salvage, since you mentioned it. http://www.coralmarine.com/salvage.htmOnly when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realize we cannot eat money. -Cree Indian ProverbSA 200 LincolnVictor Torches
Reply:Bob, very well said. I knew there was a reason I liked you.
Reply:well said BOB! Heres an idea for a show,follow a weldor around who chases land based drilling rigs around. You say you want a show about under water welding, how about under mud welding how to make a sound weld under mud? it can be done? it works best while standing on your head. You talk about thinking on your feet you also have to think on your head. picture this for a scene weldor has not slept in three days,wraps up truck and is ready to go home it is 2 AM some ruffneck comes up to the weldor as he pulls his leg out of mud soaked coveralls anticapating his warm bed at home, Hey there mister welder i forgot to tell you there is a broken gate valve in mud tank! LOOK OUT you think mr tuttle on occ is a character? Any way you look at it the proffesional metal burner he is a unsung hero in our great countries he is often took for granted ,wrote off as a grumpy old s.o.b. But without the weldor who can fix anything in demanding situations we would be in a heap of trouble so I hope the forgotten art of demascus is not a sign off things to come we will always need that grumpy old s.o b. p.s that same ruffneck that got a thorough reaming was sure happy the weldor was in better spirits a month later when his hitch broke on his r.v on side of road
Reply:Kate, I am no where near the welder that most of the folks on here are, just a hobbiest. On this forum there are some really talented people that push themselves to think outside of the box. Spend a little or alot of time looking through the "
rojects" section of this forum and see some of the amazing things that have been built by the "little guy". Yankee inginuity at its best.
Reply:Another possible aspect of underwater welding that I didn't see mentioned is in law enforcement. I don't know how much if any they actually use today, but years ago when I was teaching welding, I set up a hands on underwater work platform for a law enforcement dive seminar. The idea was that mostly the cutting aspect could have a use in crime scene investigation. Might be worth a look into it and thanks for tugging the cobwebs off of some fond memories....maniak
Reply:Kate, Oh Kate,Where are you? Have you decided on what you are going to do for sure yet?Please fill us in.Bob
Reply:I don't think there is enough, "danger, excitement, life threatening situations, and not to mention a superviser, or boss screaming his head off at someone" in "normal, average, everyday welding" to be what she's looking for in a show. Without the Drama, there is nothing that hooks people!------John
Reply:I don't think there is enough, "danger, excitement, life threatening situations, and not to mention a superviser, or boss screaming his head off at someone" in "normal, average, everyday welding" to be what she's looking for in a show. Without the Drama, there is nothing that hooks people!------John
Reply:Guess Kate got all she needed from us. I emailed her the first day she posted as directed in her post but she never answered that email.Bummer.
Reply:Originally Posted by jptechI don't think there is enough, "danger, excitement, life threatening situations, and not to mention a superviser, or boss screaming his head off at someone" in "normal, average, everyday welding" to be what she's looking for in a show. Without the Drama, there is nothing that hooks people!------John
Reply:I take it that Kate or this network never came back. I too have to agree with Bob on this thread. Why just Underwater welding. There have been shows on this in the past! As pointed out and as shown on those previous shows almost all the work was done on shore and then the rigs were towed out to sea and placed in position. The shows I saw only showed routine maintenance being done underwater.A show on the "entire" community of welding would give the producers far more material to draw from. Showing how to make something from a customer's idea and seeing it all come together would be far more interesting. And please leave out all the in fighting and folks with a chip on their shoulder's.Co-Own CNC shop:Miller :1251 plasma cutter, MaxStar 700 TIG/Stick, & XMT 456 Multiprocess Welder.& 2 Hypertherm HPR260's Plasma CutterSorry I had a bad stroke but now I am back.
Reply:TV only does over the top drama. American Idol, The Apprentice, Big Brother, Dancing with the Stars, The Bachelorette, Deal or No Deal, Wife Swap; and all the other drivel that I refuse to watch (looked 'em up in the TV guide). Single and pick my own channels: Welding Web: Miller Welding: Hobart: SFT: MicroZone.9-11-2001......We Will Never ForgetRetired desk jockey. Hobby weldor with a little training. Craftsman O/A---Flat, Vert, Ovhd, Horz. Miller Syncrowave 250
Reply:The unsung hero that bids a job at 500.00 and goes over 300.00 or so and eats the labor because he gave you his word in the estimate. These people never get a pat on the back just over looked. Have the samething happen at a auto repair shop and see what happens.1990 SA 200Miller 225 Rip Miller302Miller 135Lincoln 200 MigHypertherm 600 PlasmaPlasma Cam Cutting TableMikita Cold SawJL Welding Tx . com
