In one of the most original, sad, and, therefore, daunting tasks I’ve ever heard of, Natascha Whitehurst is using her talent for welding to fabricate her own parents’ tombstones.

Instead of the usual headstones, Natascha is crafting two oak stumps (made from a water heater tank), connected by a root (made from an exhaust pipe), bearing their names and dates etched in the metal.

Welder honors her Mother & Father

By Laura Gutschke
Posted January 2, 2010

TUSCOLA — Rusted metal scrap objects long past their original function are finding new life as art at the hands of Natascha Whitehurst.

One of her current projects also is her most personal. She is crafting out of a discarded water heater’s inner steel tank a double tombstone for her parents. The tombstone looks like two oak stumps connected by a root, to be made out of a vehicle exhaust pipe.

“Instead of buying new, I like using what is already out there,” Whitehurst said.

Rows of small welding beads will run down the side of the tank to resemble bark. On top of the 18-inch tree stump for her mother, Janice Sadler, who died on Jan. 1, 2009, will be a watering can to symbolize her nurturing of the family.

A rifle will be leaning against the stump for her father, Harley Sadler, who continues to work as a truck driver today, to represent his providing for the family and his love of hunting.

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I never thought I’d see the day. Let me repeat that – NEVER.

But the day has indeed arrived, from whence forward, a newbie welder will be able to practice welding, not the old-fashioned way, with torch and electrode, but via virtual reality.

You can thank Lincoln Electric for this new advancement in welding technology — they are the producers of the new VRTEX 360 which enables the wearer to weld via a virtual welding gun and a helmet that is equipped with monitors on the inside.

You can “virtually” weld in a welding booth, on a construction site — even on a base in the desert!

And, it has to be said, this is the greenest welding machine on the market, and it will enable students to learn faster than ever before.

Who knows — this newest welding “video game” could become so popular that instructors will have to pry the virtual torch right out of their students’ unwilling hands.

One can only hope.

Want some free Miller welding equipment???

This month, Miller Electric is giving away over $2,000 worth of welding supplies to one lucky grand prize winner!

To enter for a chance to win, just sign up for one of Miller’s eNewsletters to keep in touch with industry news and the latest how-to advice!

Complete Grand Prize Package:

• Choice of Millermatic® 211 Auto-Set™ MIG welder, Diversion™ 165 TIG welder, OR Spectrum® 375 X-TREME plasma cutter
• ArcStation™ welding workbench
• Performance Series™ auto-darkening welding helmet
• Arc Armor combo welding jacket
• Pair of MIG, TIG, and Metalworker gloves
• iPod touch

Now that Christmas is long since past, it’s the perfect time for planning ahead and buying this coming year’s Christmas cards!

And what better cards could you possibly find than those of Santa Clause doing what he does best — welding?  That’s right, the jolly ol’ fellow is takin’ off some time to do some long-needed repairs around town.

I’m sure this is the best card I’ve seen of its kind — of which there are very few — and I’m sure you’ll join me in thanking Oliver Chipping for creating this marvelous card!

Did you know what you wanted to do for a career when you were a freshman in high school?  I didn’t!  I don’t really know anyone who did — isn’t that what college is for?

Lyndsi Tingle did.  She wanted to be a welder, and she and her teachers agree — she’s on the right track to succeed.

Frankfort Face: She makes sparks fly

By Katheran Wasson

Lyndsi Tingle wore men’s welding gloves for three years before she realized they made smaller pairs for women.

The 17-year-old Western Hills High School senior welds, cuts and bends metal alongside the boys at Franklin County Career and Technical Center.

She spends four hours a day in tan Carhartt overalls and a T-shirt, safety goggles propped on her blonde head.

“Most of the guys kind of look at me as mama,” she said, sitting in the workshop before winter break.

“If something needs to be done, they know that I’m going to be on them to do it.”

Lyndsi has known since freshman year that she wanted to make a career out of welding.

After graduation, she and five of her classmates will head to Tulsa Welding School in Jacksonville, Fla., to study the craft.

She hopes to eventually become an inspector, checking the welds on bridges, power plants and pipes to make sure they are secure.

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It appears that wood and plain-old steel just aren’t cutting it any more.  No, for furniture with built-in character, try making it out of your old rusted-out cars!

Furniture from Old Car Parts? Yep.

By Jaime Derringer
Dec 8th 2009

Joel Hester’s love affair with old and vintage metals began two years ago.

A client brought him a small metal beer sign that he wanted to use as a top for a coffee table. Joel, who lives in Dallas, Texas, knew a little something about making furniture from unexpected materials; he was already welding steel into custom bed frames.

So he made the coffee table — and then got an idea. Why not start a business? He’s since developed a passion for making custom furniture out of old cars. He calls it The Weld House.

But why cars? Well, when he received the client’s beer sign, he wondered how he could make it work since the sign wasn’t large enough to wrap the top of the table for a smooth, seamless surface.

So, after over a month of struggling with the process, Joel ended up wandering through a junk yard looking for scrap metal that might work with the beer sign.

“I turned a corner and saw an old Cadillac,” he says. “Its large trunk was the coolest mixture of color and patterns. I knew I could skin the metal off the structure of the trunk and use it to wrap the top of the table.”

Joel instantly forgot about the beer sign and called his client proposing a new, different idea of how to create the table: an old car!

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An introduction to friction stir welding

By Jeff Defalco, Contributing Writer

September 15, 2009

A relatively new joining process, friction stir welding (FSW) produces no fumes; uses no filler material; and can join aluminum alloys, copper, magnesium, zinc, steels, and titanium. FSW sometimes produces a weld that is stronger than the base material.

Friction stir welding (FSW) is a relatively new joining process that has been used for high production since 1996. Because melting does not occur and joining takes place below the melting temperature of the material, a high-quality weld is created. This characteristic greatly reduces the ill effects of high heat input, including distortion, and eliminates solidification defects. Friction stir welding also is highly efficient, produces no fumes, and uses no filler material, which make this process environmentally friendly.

History

Friction stir welding was invented by The Welding Institute (TWI) in December 1991. TWI filed successfully for patents in Europe, the U.S., Japan, and Australia. TWI then established TWI Group-Sponsored Project 5651,”Development of the New Friction Stir Technique for Welding Aluminum,” in 1992 to further study this technique.

The development project was conducted in three phases. Phase I proved FSW to be a realistic and practical welding technique, while at the same time addressing the welding of 6000 series aluminum alloys. Phase II successfully examined the welding of aerospace and ship aluminum alloys, 2000 and 5000 series, respectively. Process parameter tolerances, metallurgical characteristics, and mechanical properties for these materials were established. Phase III developed pertinent data for further industrialization of FSW.

Since its invention, the process has received world-wide attention, and today FSW is used in research and production in many sectors, including aerospace, automotive, railway, shipbuilding, electronic housings, coolers, heat exchangers, and nuclear waste containers.

“If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

This expression makes absolutely no sense if you’re in the profession of welding.

#1: If you can’t stand the heat, why the heck are you a welder?

#2: There is no kitchen. What kitchen? If you’re welding in a kitchen, get out of that kitchen. Right now! There are gas mains!

#3: If you can stand the heat, and you’re not in a kitchen, then why would you move? Stay right there!

In fact, let’s add some more heat. Let’s add some… friction.

That’s right, you heard me. Friction, as in friction stir welding. FSW. It’s all the rage in… in…

Just read…

An introduction to friction stir welding

By Jeff Defalco, Contributing Writer
September 15, 2009

A relatively new joining process, friction stir welding (FSW) produces no fumes; uses no filler material; and can join aluminum alloys, copper, magnesium, zinc, steels, and titanium. FSW sometimes produces a weld that is stronger than the base material.

Friction stir welding (FSW) is a relatively new joining process that has been used for high production since 1996. Because melting does not occur and joining takes place below the melting temperature of the material, a high-quality weld is created. This characteristic greatly reduces the ill effects of high heat input, including distortion, and eliminates solidification defects.

Friction stir welding also is highly efficient, produces no fumes, and uses no filler material, which make this process environmentally friendly.

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It’s midnight at a community college in Oregon.  The classroom is brightly lit, and the students are up and about and… welding?

Thanks to a new series of “graveyard” welding classes, this has become a regular feature of several area colleges.

In the Midnight Hour

By David Moltz
December 9, 2009

Midnight classes, once a quirky scheduling option available at only a few institutions, are gaining currency at a growing number of community colleges as student demand for specific courses increases and available classroom space for those courses decreases.

Photo: Carl Graham / Clackamas Community College

Though it is unclear which institutions pioneered the idea, Clackamas Community College, in Oregon, began offering what became known as “graveyard welding classes,” lasting from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m., two nights a week last spring.

The classes were so popular that the college expanded them to four nights a week this fall, and students can now take five different welding courses during the “graveyard shift,” ranging from an introductory section to those focusing on specialized projects.

John Phelps, one of two adjunct welding instructors who lead the late-night courses, said the college’s experiment with these sections was a matter of necessity.

Even with some welding sections available on the weekends, he said, the college reached its capacity for these courses last fall and was forced to turn away a number of students.

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Edith Kent just turned 100 this past year.  Her fondest memories?
Those of being a woman welder in the Plymouth shipyards, where she was the first female to be paid a man’s wage.

Edith Kent, wartime welder and the first woman to receive equal pay, turns 100

Being 4ft 11in paid off for Edith Kent.

Her diminutive stature meant that she could crawl inside torpedo tubes — and helped her to become the first woman in Britain to earn the same wage as her male colleagues while working as a welder during the Second World War.

This week Mrs Kent celebrated her 100th birthday with a tea dance at a hotel with 50 family and friends, including her sister Minna, 105.

Mrs Kent began working at Devonport dockyard in Plymouth in 1941 but was so good that she received wage parity in 1943 — which was unheard of at the time.

Starting on five pounds and six shillings (£5 6s) a week as a skilled female worker, she was soon given a rise to £6 6s. A male manual worker in 1943 would have been on a weekly wage of only £5 8s 6d.

Mrs Kent, who still lives near the dockyard, said she was extremely proud of her signal achievement but she was embarrassed at the time.

She said: “I got the job because my brothers worked at the dockyard and they thought I would be good at it. I was the first woman to work as a welder there. It made me a bit uncomfortable that I was the first woman to earn the same as the men — and in some cases I was earning more than them. All the men I worked with were marvellous and they didn’t seem to mind me earning the same.

“None of them ever dared say it, but I think they knew I was worth as much as them, if not more,” she said. Mrs Kent took time off to have her only child, Jean, in 1942 and then went back to work — leaving the baby with one of her sisters. She worked at the dockyard until 1945 when the male workers returned from war and she left to work as a barmaid.

Mrs Kent’s daughter, Jean, 66, said: “My mother has lived a remarkable life. After I was born she went straight back to work. She was a pioneer of girl power.”

Mrs Kent, who still lives near the dockyard, said she was extremely proud of her signal achievement but she was embarrassed at the time.

She said: “I got the job because my brothers worked at the dockyard and they thought I would be good at it. I was the first woman to work as a welder there.

It made me a bit uncomfortable that I was the first woman to earn the same as the men — and in some cases I was earning more than them. All the men I worked with were marvellous and they didn’t seem to mind me earning the same.

“None of them ever dared say it, but I think they knew I was worth as much as them, if not more,” she said.

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The Torch Queen. I’d love to have a nickname like that — well, wouldn’t you? Unfortunately (well, fortunately for her), this name has already been taken, and it belongs to Bonnie Wynn Ramirez of Indianapolis.

This Torch Queen lives up to her name by teaching her ongoing (and highly popular) welding classes in Indiana while still maintaining her Flameworks art studio out of Austin, Texas.

Local grandmother welds metal to dreams

Sep 14, 2009
Andrea Morehead/Eyewitness News

Indianapolis – The age-old art form of welding, before the hammering, soldering and sanding, requires the artisan to wear the proper gear. From the gloves to the goggles, this job is not for the faint of heart as the metal rain showers fall from the hands of The Torch Queen.

Bonnie Wynn Ramirez has been getting praise for her metal work since the nineties with commissioned work in the public and private sectors. The national recognition is the result of a desire for fire. It all began when she took a summer class.

“Summer in Texas, triple digits, welding, yeah. You sweat in places you didn’t know you could sweat,” Bonnie said.

The part-time course sparked a full-time interest for this grandmother. She then enrolled in the arts metal program at Austin Community College.

“It was my mid-life emancipation you know. No crisis for me. I’m like hand me a torch, I’m good,” she said.

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For more information about the Torch Queen and her ongoing and past projects, you can visit her website at www.torchqueen.com ->