Say, you’re taking your car for repairs or getting an estimate on a new grill installed in your home. You’re talking to the foreman or agent about the specifics of the job, the fees, and so forth when the welder walks by, exchanges a few words with them, and walks away.
This would be fine except that maybe a good quarter of that exchange was full of language that you didn’t understand. If you get the chance to walk into any welding companies in Edmonton, for example, you would want to know a little more about what are they planning to do to your beloved property.
Well, no need to worry, as welders don’t say things like these to deliberately confuse customers. After working in the profession for so long, they’ve simply developed shorthand for the more common things that they’ll encounter, which can be useful when talking to other welders.
If you want to know more, here are some choice words from a welder’s glossary that could be helpful to you:
Golden Arm
This is one of the highest compliments that welders can give one another. If the one working on your project is referred to by this term, this usually means they have excellent technique and can be relied on for good results.
Flux
This is basically a metal cleaner. Welders will often apply this material to any metal that needs work to dissolve rust and release possible gases trapped in the material. Gases can affect the final result if left on the surface.
Dogleg
You might hear this one passed around when examining a bad weld. It generally means there are two layers of long-running pipe that have been welded improperly and are now crooked.
Liquidus and Solidus
They’re not fantasy or gaming terms. They mean the heating points as to when metals liquefy or the highest temperature a metal can get and still remain solid, respectively. It’s useful to know when different kinds of metal are involved.
Wowie
This isn’t an expression of surprise, but rather dismay. A welder is most likely to say this when they notice that any welded material has a bend that isn’t supposed to be there.
Arc Cutting
This refers to a way of cutting where the material is literally melted by the heat caused by interactions between the metal and the electrodes. You’ll hear this a lot when you’re doing renovations, depending on the material used.
GP
These are holes in the weld metal. Depending on their size, the metal can either still be worked on by covering the holes up with a material such as mud or be coated with something to fill in the gaps (though, this isn’t always recommended).
Fizzle
The sparks given off by welding are called fizzle. They are more common when carbon arc welding is used on metal.
You might not be a welder, but with this beginner’s guide to the language they use, you might be a little more experienced and can hold a conversation with the next welder you will hire for a particular project.
