Welding Tips and Tricks

Hey guys.

So the shop decided to bid on a job for stainless hand rails and got it. Then someone either ordered the wrong material by accident or on purpose to save money (38mm tube with 1.6mm wall thickness vs the proper like 1 1/4" schedule 40)

We built the rails to the prints installed them then found out the client wasn't happy at all and they needed to be redone. Shop orders the right material this time but it's unfinished stainless. Ooooh goodie well as a steel fab shop they don't have pipe sanders and proper finishing tools. Aside from a 3/8" dynabrade belt sander and a 4" burnisher. And access to a belt sander one of the guys has from his own home shop.

Oh and now we had 2 weeks to do 2 flights of stairs and 2 landing rails and it's the week before Xmas and it'll take 3 weeks to get a proper tube sander.

Here's what we came up with using some German ingenuity YouTube and an impossible deadline
Using the belt sander and Rollerblade wheels at a slight angle to do initial finishing of the material before fit and weld. The angle of the wheels fed the pipe thru the machine at a consistent speed and worked quite well.









Oops.... how did those get there?
If anyone else has devised time or hassle saving setups like this feel free to share in here.

christhewelder75 wrote: Hopefully management has learned some thing from this colossal crap show.

Naaah! It got done, right?? So nooooo problem at all to do/offer the same to another customer!

Bye, Arno.

Well not quite done we have till the end of the month. Have 4 floor opening rails still to fit and weld and finish. Oh and install. I don't think it's gonna hit the deadline I'll do my best but times not on our side