AWS D17.1 Welding questions

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I have a long list of welding questions I need help with! But first a quick history... I work for a company that manufactures parts for the aerospace industry. We are in the process of starting up a welding department so we can keep most of our work in house rather than sub it out to other contractors. We are working towards getting Nadcap accreditation, but for right now we are compliant (for the most part) with AWS D17.1. We will be doing all of our welding via GTAW. I personally am not a welder, but I am familiar with welding as my Dad was a welder. I was never very good at it.  Currently I'm the QA department Manager / Weld Shop Supervisor for my company.To start off my list of questions... Anybody here familiar with the AWS D17.1 "Specification for Fusion Welding for Aerospace Applications"? This is where most of my questions come from. Below are my top questions.  There will be more to come, but I feel like this is a good starting point. PQR qualification:How are the PQR tests done? Do we have to weld a sample part or joint configuration, send it out for testing and wait for the tests to get back before we can proceed with welding the rest of the order?Do you go by the requirements in AWS B2.1, or the alternate method in AWS D17.1, section 5.4.4?If going by alternate method, what tests are performed? Same as table 5.5? What if Engineering Authority doesn’t specify tests to be performed?If going by AWS B2.1  - how do we do this? I’m lost in the spec! Doesn’t make sense right now.Thanks in advance for the help!
Reply:You would most likely get some very good answers to your question if you went to the AWS website and asked your questions in the forum there. Some very knowledgeable people on there.
Reply:half way through your post, i started thinking exactly what "theweldor" reccomended.    those guys will make it sound so  technical though, you'll just get confused.    We are just down to earth regular welders here.   We just do it to indusrty standard.   Industry standard is : show up, BS and bully your way through it, worry about the paper after it's to late, and act like we didn't know better.   sometimes thats the only way to get any work done.
Reply:You shouldn't need to go outside of the D17.1 to do PQR's and make WPS's. I am not super familiar with the B2.1, it's sitting on my desk waiting to be read, but have worked quite a bit with the code in question. All of the qualification tests in the code are somewhat standard fillet welds and groove welds unless you are wanting a specific, usually non-standard, weld configuration inspected. If that's the case then you are getting outside the realm of the code and more into the engineering side of things. It can be kind of a tricky code depending on what "Class" weld you are making. The code also states that if you are making non-flight hardware it's usually much cheaper to make your parts to another code. If you have any questions at all about weld quality I would hold off on making a significant number of parts until you have a qualified procedure in hand. The requirements to pass the tests can be much more stringent than other codes. Also, all of the tests require many more specimens per coupon than would normally be tested.
Reply:Originally Posted by burnsYou shouldn't need to go outside of the D17.1 to do PQR's and make WPS's. I am not super familiar with the B2.1, it's sitting on my desk waiting to be read, but have worked quite a bit with the code in question. All of the qualification tests in the code are somewhat standard fillet welds and groove welds unless you are wanting a specific, usually non-standard, weld configuration inspected. If that's the case then you are getting outside the realm of the code and more into the engineering side of things. It can be kind of a tricky code depending on what "Class" weld you are making. The code also states that if you are making non-flight hardware it's usually much cheaper to make your parts to another code. If you have any questions at all about weld quality I would hold off on making a significant number of parts until you have a qualified procedure in hand. The requirements to pass the tests can be much more stringent than other codes. Also, all of the tests require many more specimens per coupon than would normally be tested.
Reply:Thanks for all the responses.. I finally found the forum on AWS, but still haven't received an answer yet. After reading through some of the threads I'm more confused than ever!
Reply:well, you got one answer over there.   looks like you did better here.    there was a thread called "code for areospace applications" that had quite a few replies over there that talked about 17.1.     it was on the bottom of the first page under general welding category
Reply:Originally Posted by SamuraiThanks for all the responses.. I finally found the forum on AWS, but still haven't received an answer yet. After reading through some of the threads I'm more confused than ever!
Reply:I only have one other thought to add. You probably can't read a code book 1 time and expect to really know anything. If you have only read it once or twice, or not at all, and not actually studied all the different parts and flipped back and forth between pages 5000 times it probably won't make a lot of sense. You need to actually read AND understand what the book is saying. My boss took his CWI test on the API 1104 and has READ the D1.1 one time, not studied but read, and he doesn't understand what it means in the slightest. He always tells me he has READ the book but when you ask him what F-Class a specific rod is in he won't have the slightest clue what you are asking about. How to test a fillet weld? Absolutely no clue, for years he certified welders with a visual only on fillet welds with GMAW-S, which is wrong for a number of very basic reasons. You want to make a PQR/WPS for a plate test with short-circuit transfer with no RT or UT? He'll do it even though GMAW-S is not prequalified. When I first ventured out of the D1.1 I would read new codes one time all the way through, no shortcuts, and then start going chapter by chapter figuring out what all the little notes and references refer to, what the tables and diagrams refer to, etc., etc.,. . If you want to be good on the code books there is absolutely no shortcut for just sitting down and figuring it out. It sucks the first couple of times but gets easier the more times you do it.
Reply:@ burns - your boss passed the CWI for API code and can not discern the intricacies of the D1.1 code. Uncool. Sounds as if he unadaptable. Shovelon is a proven professional and provided you with sage advice.@ Samurai- Recommend you PURCHASE the AWS D17.1 Asrospace code and rip some focused self-study.  It's straight forward.  Invest the time now to burn-in and understand the code from top to bottom and you will achieve nirvana in the long run.  Forget the shortcuts.  There is no substitution for self-actualization and acedemic "illumination".  Go forth and conquer....Last edited by ManoKai; 07-22-2015 at 08:47 PM."Discovery is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think what nobody else has thought" - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi