Sophmore Week 1 - Underwater Welding

Day Twenty Nine : 0800
Temperature : Not too bad
Mood : Monday again...&Fht@1s5^

Spaghetti Monday, lunch is about the only thing I'm looking forward to right now. Well it's the start of my Sophmore Month and to kick things off, it's starting off with 180 amps being run through the water. However, before we can get to that point...it's time for some classroom teaching. Nothing too special, basically just gave us a brief overview on how to set up the welder and check connectivity, check for bad spots in the cable, how to splice welding cable, etc.


Day Thirty : 0800
Temperature : Cooling down slightly
Mood : Inbetween Want to Kill somebody and I just won the lotto

Tuesday, is another tuesday, in another week. But this Tuesday, we're welding. Topside that is, which is interesting considering that I've never welded in my life. haha. My goal : Successfully tact weld 3 pieces of 2 inch by 8 inch mild steel together for tomorrow's actual welding. Good thing I don't mind getting hurt since this has "uh oh" written all over it.....The good news is, that after what most would consider a circus act, that the pieces got welded together. The bad news is I managed to catch the bench on fire and light the entire 7014 electrode completely on fire. Don't know how I did it, but I did. Since we didn't have anything else planned for the day, I figure I'd try to actually weld something. Definitely interesting, took me a few tries to get the hang of it, they don't look pretty at all, but they would work. I am pleased with my success.


Day Thirty One : 0800
Temperature : Cold...again
Mood : I just want to go back to bed

Wednesday, is a good day, because I know that today and tomorrow are going to be dive days. I get to dive first so after we get everything set up, I take my project to the deck and dress out. I climb down into the tanks and set up everything. Ground Clamp, Check. Four Electrodes, Check. Electrode, Check, Balls of steel, Double Check. Time to go to work, I set my angles and yell "make it hot" and let the bright white glow do all the work. 49 seconds later it was all over and that was it. I did that 3 more times, climb to the surface and walk straight into the second tank to run the chainsaw. I'm singing the song quote "anything you can do, I can do underwater" to myself at this point. It's official. I have lost my mind. After another minute, I was done and I climb up and out. I dry off, inspect my welds which turns out we're some of the best in the class, (everybody else couldn't keep it in the groove) and spend the rest of the day back in the Welding Shop. I'm determined to run at least 1 good bead by the end of this school.


Day Thirty Two : 0800
Temperature : Windy, 50, Sunny, Cloudy. MAKE UP YOUR MIND!
Mood : Headache

Today, I got the pleasure of being stand-by diver...except its just sit around all day diver since the tanks are partially covered by grating and if there is a problem somehow it's easier to just pull them up instead of splashing the diver. So today is full of antics, laughter, bullshitting and telling people they shouldn't put "underwater welder" on their resume. Superglue expert is a better title for most of them. haha


Day Thirty Three : 0800
Temperature : Rain
Mood : TGIF. I'm getting hammered.

Today we started off by reviewing any questions we had with Walt over the welding and went over the entire question bank for the test. Took the test at 1030 and reviewed it all before lunch. I got a 94%. I'm happy with that, puts my lowest grade on a test so far at 88% with Anatomy and Dive Medicine ( which was still the highest grade in the class, so take that for what it's worth). After lunch we started Walt's version of Dive Charts and Hyperbaric Chamber Operation and Orientation. So it was note taking for the rest of the day till 1530 when Friday Cleanup proceeded to take place. Muster at 1645 and at the bar by 1700. I've earned it this week

Day Thirty Four / Thirty Five : 1030-1200
Temperature : Defintely Chilly
Mood : UGH! what a good night but my head hurts

The weekend can be summed up into a short statement. "Sleep all day and Party all night. Enough said. ( School work comes first Sunday Night - Thursday Night )