Saw a welder fail a simple bend test last Tuesday

I was at a fab shop in Portland last week watching a guy lay down these beautiful beads on a 3/8 plate. He was so proud of his work, but when the inspector did the bend test, it cracked right along the fusion line. Turned out he was running his wire speed way too hot and not letting the puddle wet out properly. The inspector said it was textbook cold lap even though it looked perfect on the surface. Has anyone else run into a situation where a pretty weld failed a test like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

iris_rivera441mo ago

You ever wonder how many "perfect" welds are just pretty failures waiting to happen? I've seen guys chase a mirror finish all day but skip the basics like proper preheat and travel speed.

the_eva1mo agoMost Upvoted

Oh man, that's a rough one. Just a small nitpick though - that's actually more of a lack of fusion issue than cold lap, cold lap is when the weld metal rolls over without bonding to the base plate. The inspector was probably using cold lap as a blanket term but technically they're different problems. I've seen guys crank the wire speed way up trying to get that flat profile and it ends up burying the root pass, so the bend test exposes all those hidden voids. Pretty welds can definitely fool you if you're not watching the puddle behavior close enough.