NHRA weld inspection

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I know I'll probably catch heck for asking this, but here goes. NHRA requires mild steel cages to be mig or tig welded, but can they really tell the difference between a mig or oa weld?
Reply:MIG or O/A?  If they can't, I'd say they shouldn't be inspecting welds of any type IMO.MM200 w/Spoolmatic 1Syncrowave 180SDBobcat 225G Plus - LP/NGMUTT Suitcase WirefeederWC-1S/Spoolmatic 1HF-251D-1PakMaster 100XL '68 Red Face Code #6633 projectStar Jet 21-110Save Second Base!
Reply:yes they can tell the difference..... i live here in las Vegas and the people here are really strict on there cages! right down to the load plates! i couldnt get the plate to fit being 6x6 so i cut it to 5x6.... ended up having to cut it out and make it work with 6x6SIN CITY METAL WORKSvisit my YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/devvon
Reply:Guess. Attached ImagesCity of L.A. Structural; Manual & Semi-Automatic;"Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place where gold is refined. Iron is taken from the earth, and copper is smelted from ore."Job 28:1,2Lincoln, Miller, Victor & ISV BibleDanny
Reply:Cold mig weld is my guess.
Reply:Flair bevel is wire FCAW of some kind?
Reply:The Square Groove is manual feed filler of some kind?
Reply:1. The lap weld is Oxy-Acetylene.2. The flair-bevel is AC 6011.Usually it is easy to tell one process from another. Sometimes not as easy though.  City of L.A. Structural; Manual & Semi-Automatic;"Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place where gold is refined. Iron is taken from the earth, and copper is smelted from ore."Job 28:1,2Lincoln, Miller, Victor & ISV BibleDanny
Reply:OK, I'll fess up.My guess was a slightly cold TIG on the lap joint and O/A on the flair-bevel but no MIG on either.  But then, I'm not an NHRA or otherwise weld inspector. MM200 w/Spoolmatic 1Syncrowave 180SDBobcat 225G Plus - LP/NGMUTT Suitcase WirefeederWC-1S/Spoolmatic 1HF-251D-1PakMaster 100XL '68 Red Face Code #6633 projectStar Jet 21-110Save Second Base!
Reply:I went down this path with the NHRA once with a chassis I was repairing. The "rules" said Tig only. Well for this particular application it was more favorable to O/A weld as I was hot forming a finger patch anyway. Call up the NHRA tech director ans ask him how to get the O/A process approved and on what basis they deemed Tig to be THE method. He said " thats what SFI told us". Call up the head technical director at SFI and ask them, he says "Thats what one of the big chassis builders told us was the best way". So I asked if SFI ever did any testing to validate their mandate, "no". So what you have is the ruling body making safety decisions based on the opinion of some chassis builder, nice huh? Anyway long story short, the chassis was O/A welded, approved,  and continues to run. BTW it was a 4130 chassis, and the weld that failed was one of those cute little tiny tig dollhouse welds. A poor design welded with an unforgiving method and process, a real bad combination.