Help Stop Wasting of Student Welding Materials

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We use a massive amount of material teaching our welders GTAW welding aon 1" NPS Carbon Steel Socket Welds and Also for Monel 400 NICU Socket Welds. We cut the pipe from the welds to reuse the pipe, but we are told that we must cut one inch away from the welds because the hardened metal from welding would damage the blades in our band DoALL Band Saw (Model C-916M). Is there away we can treat the metal through some heat treat ment process so that the welded metal will not damage the band saw blades?Is there an special band saw blades that would not wear- if the blades break or wear to fast it would not be time or cost efficent compared to the price we save on material or would it?We would like to cut the welds right at the socket couplings so that we can reuse the sockets also.I am looking for several sugestions to help save us money. Each Monel Socket costs over $100 a piece.I am open to any suggestions for our welding students.(See Attachment) Attached Images
Reply:Use an abrasive cutoff saw.  You will still need to bore the pipe out of the fitting due to the penetration, but abrasive discs are cheap in comparison to bandsaw blades.
Reply:Do you need to use a band saw for this? How about an abrasive wheel? If you are doing a large quantity, the extra prep time required would not be that great.
Reply:Why use the sockets that cost 100.00?Use steel round stock!Classic 1D 200SAE 30086 SA 200Hyperthem 45Jancy Mag Force O/A Victor-GossCable's remote2-12" Mathey Dearman bevelersLN 25Miller Auto Set 211Wendy's Pancake/Jackson PipelinerNew Holland LS 180Great story man....tell it again!
Reply:Abrasive cut off disc or chop saw.  Students can make a jig to hold the unit in place for the chop saw as another project.
Reply:I agree with the abrasive blade suggestion and would also suggest then annealing the sockets before 'cleaning' them up on a lathe, at least for the carbon steel ones. I'm not too familiar with heat treating of monel.If the joint shown is typical of the student's work, I'd think more practice running beads on flat stock, plain round stock, corners of rectangular material and such would be a cheaper way to give them practice at manipulation and seeing how their bead is progressing.
Reply:I think the simple solution is to use carbon steel until the student has progressed to a certain point that they need to actually run on monel to see how it flows compared to CS.  Bead placement and torch movement can be taught on carbon steel as it will not vary much between different materials, but it is probably the most time consuming aspect of teaching a new welder.Have we all gone mad?
Reply:Lathe?.No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth! Ronald Reagan
Reply:it looks like a very simple bar stock or heavy wall pipe part. sure the material is not cheap, but how could it be a $100 part in any quantity?business cash advance
Reply:Originally Posted by advancescashit looks like a very simple bar stock or heavy wall pipe part. sure the material is not cheap, but how could it be a $100 part in any quantity?
Reply:I agree with DSW that turning is the best option if you want to re-claim the socket from a monel to monel joint. Heat treating would do nothing meaningful.If the other side of that socket is steel to monel, I have no idea what that would machine like.Trying to grind copper/nickel based material is just frustrating, the material just pulls the abrasive out of the wheel and it sticks in the material itself. In machining, very friable silicon carbide wheels are used and they get used up pretty fast.Matt
Reply:I'd cut them with a 6" (we like Radnor and Pferd, preferring Radnor of the two) cutting disc. We got rid of our horizontal band saw a couple of years ago. Waste of space in our structural/pipe weld lab. 6" discs are why I'll never buy another personal 4.5" grinder. The grinders are the same size, the cutting discs have a much higher surface speed, and they last a lot longer. If you don't trust the students not to destroy handheld 6" grinders by using them on stuff they shouldn't, an abrasive chop saw is inexpensive and works fine too. Our Makitas have lasted for years under student abuse.We had students perfect their carbon and stainless technique on butt welds before using up our (donated) sockets. Carbon first, MANY repetitions because time under hood matters most, then stainless. Socket welds afterward, but those were no problem after lots of butt welds. Ask any local companies if they have leftovers. We were donated a large bin of scrap (because they had rust) sockets. Easily cleaned up with a 1" flap wheel, they have been very useful. If your school can give tax receipts the donor company can do very nicely donating stuff they'd scrap otherwise. By the way, the Milwaukee 5196 is the end grinder of the gods. Driving flap wheels for pipe prep, and three or four-inch cutting discs by using a mandrel (mandrels are CHEAP, great for feathering pipe tacks, and they don't get abused like small angle grinders!), they endure superbly under student abuse. Stock a few cords/collets/nuts and you'll have almost no downtime.