What would you think if you saw this welding?

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I've welded for years on my farm, building and modifying vegetable equipment to fit my old tractors.  The most difficult part of learning anything new is to learn the tolerances -- everything can be more perfect, and I don't know "how perfect is good enough" in the real world.  Sure, nothing has broken on my farm, and I have CWI papers saying I passed 3G and 4G bend tests at the community college, but I just don't know how my work stacks up if I showed it to a professional welder.I might like to begin taking on this sort of work from other farms, or helping out neighbors needing farm repairs, or perhaps even working at a local welding shop in the farm off-season.I know I'm perfectly fine for welding on my own equipment, and these welds won't break, but I really don't know what a professional welder would think of my skills here.  Could you help me out?  If I showed this work to a shop owner, would they think it looks "serviceable" "normal," or "hey, pretty good"?  I guess I'm looking for some confidence that I could actually be a serious job applicant right now if I walked into a shop, or I'm looking to know if I'm not ready for that yet, and would more be asking for help to improve my skills.  Here's some work I did recently, all 6011.  Thanks.

Cut off rusted-out deck and re-skin neighbor's bush hog

Widen hitch pins on another bush hog to match quick hitch spacing

My design, 4-row parallel-linkage cultivator for Farmall Cub (belly mount)

Two-stage high-lift pallet forks for unloading from a truck with my tractor's rear 3-point hitch (spacing for cat 1 / cat 2 pins)
Reply:Not trying to be a downer, but with a little more care you could make your welds more uniform looking.  Straight, consistent laps, fill in the ends of the welds rather than leaving a crater, etc.  There is a difference between what people will accept from a neighbour trying to help out versus a professional shop.  40 years in the industry, just my 2 cents.
Reply:I agree with bakodiver. It looks like you do have some ability. What you showed isn't "bad", and in fact I'm sure that the neighbor was satisfied. I would also think that some of the other farmers in the area would be happy to have you do some of their repairs. What people will be willing to pay for that type of work is perhaps something you will want to consider. And how much you wish to earn from your efforts will likely dictate how much you will need to invest in further training and practice.    As far as your comment on maybe working for a local welding shop - most people will not happily pay professional prices for the level you are at today. I have owned and operated the "local welding shop" for the last 21 years, and I can say with all certainty that few of my customers would pay me what I need to keep the doors open if that was the level of repair I offered. Most of my customers are farmers as well.  The biggest reason I took the time to reply is because I think you have potential for improvement, and to give you some encouragement. The villageblacksmith wishes you all the best!Last edited by villageblacksmith; 9 Hours Ago at 06:37 PM.
Reply:They will give you feed back.Just remember next you take photos 📸 backup 10 feet with wide angle lens.  They only post there best welds after painting I hope you keep posting 📫 Dave

Originally Posted by David Spring

I've welded for years on my farm, building and modifying vegetable equipment to fit my old tractors.  The most difficult part of learning anything new is to learn the tolerances -- everything can be more perfect, and I don't know "how perfect is good enough" in the real world.  Sure, nothing has broken on my farm, and I have CWI papers saying I passed 3G and 4G bend tests at the community college, but I just don't know how my work stacks up if I showed it to a professional welder.I might like to begin taking on this sort of work from other farms, or helping out neighbors needing farm repairs, or perhaps even working at a local welding shop in the farm off-season.I know I'm perfectly fine for welding on my own equipment, and these welds won't break, but I really don't know what a professional welder would think of my skills here.  Could you help me out?  If I showed this work to a shop owner, would they think it looks "serviceable" "normal," or "hey, pretty good"?  I guess I'm looking for some confidence that I could actually be a serious job applicant right now if I walked into a shop, or I'm looking to know if I'm not ready for that yet, and would more be asking for help to improve my skills.  Here's some work I did recently, all 6011.  Thanks.

Cut off rusted-out deck and re-skin neighbor's bush hog

Widen hitch pins on another bush hog to match quick hitch spacing

My design, 4-row parallel-linkage cultivator for Farmall Cub (belly mount)

Two-stage high-lift pallet forks for unloading from a truck with my tractor's rear 3-point hitch (spacing for cat 1 / cat 2 pins)
Reply:Do you do much welding with 7018?I too see a lack of consistency, in travel speed and whipping motion, not trying to be a downer either but you asked for the criticism lol.I wouldn't be happy with welds like that leaving my shop, I'd grind out and do over just to make them look nice.But that's just meThe pictures of the implements look  Greta to me, it's the picture of that large plate where I see the issues Sent from my fab shop using a mig welder and a grinderLast edited by MetalMan23; 8 Hours Ago at 07:11 PM.

http://www.philswelding.com
Reply:You can apply for anything you'd like, plenty of shops will hire for attitude and "culture" over raw welding talent. The question you should be asking yourself is what could you settle for in compensation that wouldn't be a problem or piss you off. Obviously you're aware that those welds aren't the nicest, but they certainly aren't the worst. It's a bit hard to tell but it looks like in that first picture were you running an undersize rod for the weld size you wanted? Trying to get a big wide weld out of whatever diameter you had lying around, so you turned up the amps and went slow? That would explain the heavy spatter and very short weld lengths between start/stops. It doesn't matter how skilled the welder is if his setup and "hood-up" parameters aren't dialed in right. Things like matching electrode size to welding amperage and base metal thickness. Weld prep is big, all that black soot from the paint that was still there makes things look uglier than they probably are. I get it that it's stick and farm equipment but spending the extra time to clean paint or heavy rust off stuff will make a mediocre weld look less mediocre. A lot of the things that let a "good welder" be good is the little attention to detail/going the extra mile kind of thing like solid and consistent weld prep. If you're having trouble figuring out what's a good weld, what's bad, why does this look like this etc I'd recommend you get some books to study. All welders learn by trial and error but without a base level of knowledge or some guidance it can be easy to pickup bad habits or come to the wrong conclusion. If you go to a job interview and they see bad habits or you say something wrong how does that look?I'd recommend the "Forney Welding Manual" as a cheap and baseline source of knowledge. Only $20 on amazon and it has a bunch of basics including some excellent welding exercises you can do to help practice the fundamentals, it's very much an old school book. Those fundamental exercises are often what a welding interview looks like, a basic T-joint or a lap weld and a square groove butt/bead on plate. The other book I recommend is "Metals and How to Weld them" from the Lincoln Arc welding foundation. That book has a lot more welding metallurgy in it which is helpful for figuring out what to do with mystery alloys or understanding why certain best practices are the way they are.Last edited by Thoriated Wolfram; 8 Hours Ago at 07:31 PM.
Reply:I think you are pretty good, especially for what you are working on.