Advanced Welder 1A

Course Description

Advanced Welder 1A prepares students for advancement in the welding industry. They learn to set up equipment for SMAW and GMAW open-root V-groove pipe welds, and develop an understanding of fabrication techniques including pipefitting methods and take-outs. To continue in the programme, students must pass the course with a C or better.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, PMT is the Precision Metals prefix, and the 0000-level number marks this as a postsecondary adult vocational (PSAV) clock-hour course. Daytona State publishes it at 375 clock hours — one of the largest single courses in this repository — with a $1,505.90 lab fee, prerequisite PMT0171C, offered summer. It carries zero college credit.

Open-root pipe welding is the skill that separates a welder from a well-paid welder. Welding a plate on a bench is a fundamentals exercise; running a root pass in a fixed pipe joint with no backing, out of position, that will be radiographed, is a genuinely difficult manual skill that takes hundreds of hours to acquire. That is what the 375 hours are for, and it is why the fee is what it is.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Apply welding safety practice, including fume, fire, electrical, and compressed gas hazards.
• Select and use personal protective equipment appropriate to the process and position.
• Apply hot work permit and fire watch procedures.
• Describe confined space hazards and the procedures that control them.
• Interpret welding symbols on drawings and shop prints.
• Read and apply a welding procedure specification.
• Set up and adjust SMAW equipment for pipe welding, including polarity and amperage.
• Select SMAW electrodes appropriate to the joint, position, and base metal.
• Store and handle low-hydrogen electrodes correctly.
• Set up and adjust GMAW equipment, including voltage, wire feed speed, and gas flow.
• Select shielding gas and filler wire appropriate to the application.
• Prepare V-groove joints, including bevel angle, land, and root opening.
• Fit and tack pipe joints accurately and control alignment.
• Deposit open-root passes with consistent penetration and no burn-through.
• Deposit hot, fill, and cap passes to specification.
• Weld pipe in the 2G, 5G, and 6G positions.
• Control heat input, travel speed, and work angle across position changes.
• Control distortion and describe its causes and countermeasures.
• Perform pipefitting layout, including take-outs and fitting allowances.
• Calculate pipe lengths, offsets, and rolling offsets.
• Perform visual inspection and identify weld discontinuities.
• Identify and correct common defects, including undercut, porosity, slag inclusion, and lack of fusion.
• Describe destructive and non-destructive testing methods applied to welds.
• Prepare test coupons to code requirements.
• Maintain equipment, consumables, and a safe work area.

Optional Outcomes

• Describe GTAW root pass technique on pipe.
• Describe flux-cored arc welding applications.
• Describe metallurgy of carbon steels and heat-affected zone effects.
• Describe preheat and interpass temperature control.
• Describe welding codes and their application.
• Prepare for a welder performance qualification test.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• Welding safety: fume, fire, electrical, gas
• Personal protective equipment
• Hot work permits and fire watch
• Confined space hazards
• Welding symbols and prints
• Welding procedure specifications
• SMAW equipment setup for pipe
• SMAW electrode selection
• Low-hydrogen electrode handling
• GMAW equipment setup
• Shielding gas and filler selection
• V-groove joint preparation
• Pipe fit-up and tacking
• Open-root pass technique
• Hot, fill, and cap passes
• Pipe positions: 2G, 5G, 6G
• Heat input and travel speed control
• Distortion control
• Pipefitting layout and take-outs
• Pipe length, offset, and rolling offset calculation
• Visual inspection
• Weld discontinuities and defects
• Destructive and non-destructive testing
• Test coupon preparation
• Equipment and consumable maintenance

Optional Topics

• GTAW root passes
• Flux-cored arc welding
• Carbon steel metallurgy and the heat-affected zone
• Preheat and interpass temperature
• Welding codes
• Performance qualification test preparation

Resources & Tools

• Welding: Principles and Applications (Larry Jeffus) — the most widely used programme text.
• Modern Welding (Althouse) — the other standard.
• Pipe Welding Procedures (Hoobasarian & Rossi) — the classic pipe-specific reference.
• Pipe Fitter's and Pipe Welder's Handbook (Frankland) — the take-out and layout reference, and small enough to keep in a toolbox.
• AWS D1.1 Structural Welding Code — Steel and ASME Section IX — the codes governing qualification; programmes normally provide access.
• American Welding Society (aws.org) — free information on certification, and the Certified Welder and Certified Welding Inspector pathways. See the certification flag.
• OSHA — free: the welding, cutting, and brazing standard (29 CFR 1910 Subpart Q), hexavalent chromium standard, and confined space requirements.
• NIOSH — free guidance on welding fume, manganese, and respiratory protection.
• Lincoln Electric and Miller Electric — free technical libraries, process guides, and troubleshooting charts; genuinely good and written by the manufacturers.
• Your own hood, gloves, and hand tools — an auto-darkening hood you like is worth the money over 375 hours. Ask what the $1,505.90 fee covers before buying anything.
• Arc time — the only resource that matters. Every additional hour in the booth improves the weld; nothing else does.

Career Pathways

• Pipe welder — the destination of this course, and among the best-paid trades work available; SOC 51-4121 Welders, Cutters, Solderers, and Brazers.
• Structural welder — construction, bridges, and buildings.
• Pipefitter and welder-fitter — the combined skill is more valuable than either alone.
• Power generation and utilities — Florida Power & Light, Duke Energy Florida, TECO, and JEA employ welders, and plant outage work pays premium rates.
• Shipbuilding and marine repair — a substantial Florida sector, particularly Jacksonville, Tampa, and the ports.
• Aerospace and defence fabrication — Space Coast contractors, with security-cleared roles paying more.
• Industrial maintenance and plant work — steadier hours than construction.
• Petrochemical and process piping — often travel work at high day rates.
• Pipeline welding — the highest-paid welding work, and the most demanding physically and geographically.
• Welding inspection — the AWS Certified Welding Inspector credential is a genuine career step up, easier on the body, and well paid.
• Welding instruction, sales, and technical support.
• Self-employment — mobile welding rigs are a common route; see this repository's DIG2510 guide on the business side.

Special Information

⚠⚠ This is a PSAV clock-hour course — the hours are the requirement

• A 0000-level SCNS number denotes postsecondary adult vocational instruction, measured in clock hours rather than college credits. This course carries zero college credit, and the hour figure is the real measurement.
• Attendance is a completion requirement, not a policy preference. Hours missed are hours owed, and in welding the hours are literally arc time — you cannot make up skill you did not practise.
• PSAV credit does not transfer as general education and does not carry the A.A.'s junior-status guarantee. Some Florida colleges award articulated credit toward a related A.S. degree — ask specifically and get the answer in writing.
• Financial aid rules differ for clock-hour programmes in eligibility, disbursement, and satisfactory progress. Ask the financial aid office rather than assuming.
• The credential and the certification are the point, not the transcript. Employers hire welders on tested performance; see the certification flag below.

375 hours is close to ten full working weeks, compressed into a summer term. That is the single most important planning fact about this course: it is effectively a full-time commitment, and students who plan to work full time alongside it generally do not finish.

⚠⚠ Welding safety — the hazards that cause permanent harm

• Fume is the hazard that is easiest to ignore and hardest to undo. Welding fume contains metal oxides and gases, and the composition depends on the base metal, the filler, and any coating. Manganese exposure is associated with a permanent neurological condition resembling Parkinson disease, and hexavalent chromium — produced when welding stainless steel — is a known human carcinogen with a very low OSHA permissible exposure limit.
• Use local exhaust ventilation and position yourself out of the plume. General room ventilation is not adequate protection at the arc, and keeping your head out of the fume is the single most effective habit.
• Coatings make fume far more dangerous. Galvanized steel produces zinc oxide fume causing metal fume fever; painted, plated, and solvent-degreased metal can produce highly toxic gases. Chlorinated solvents near an arc can form phosgene. Clean the metal and know what is on it.
• Confined spaces kill welders. Shielding gas displaces oxygen, fume concentrates, and the atmosphere can become lethal without any warning sign. Confined space entry requires permit procedures, atmospheric testing, ventilation, and an attendant outside — and the classic fatality is a second person entering to help.
• Arc eye (photokeratitis) is a burn to the cornea from ultraviolet radiation, it appears hours later, and it is intensely painful. It is entirely preventable with correct shade selection, and it can be caused by watching someone else's arc.
• Ultraviolet also burns skin — cover everything, including the neck and the gap at the wrists.
• Fire and explosion. Sparks travel far further than expected, smoulder for hours, and fall through gaps to floors below. Hot work permits, fire watch, and clearing combustibles are procedures, not paperwork. Never weld or cut on a container that held flammable material — this is a recurring fatal accident.
• Compressed gas cylinders must be secured upright, capped when moved, and kept from heat. Oxygen and oil or grease is an ignition hazard. Acetylene has pressure limits for a physical reason.
• Electric shock is a real risk, particularly in damp conditions and confined spaces; keep gloves and clothing dry and insulate yourself from the workpiece.
• Noise, heat stress, and ergonomics all accumulate. Florida heat plus welding gear plus a fire-resistant jacket is a genuine heat illness risk — hydrate deliberately and take breaks.
• Read the safety data sheet for every consumable. It states the fume constituents, which is what determines your ventilation and respiratory protection.

⚠⚠ The certification is what employers hire on — not the certificate of completion

• Welders are hired on tested performance. A prospective employer gives you a weld test, sends the coupon for radiography or bend testing, and hires on the result. Nobody is hired on a transcript.
• Welder performance qualification is specific to a process, position, material, thickness range, and joint configuration. A certification in one does not qualify you for another, and this is genuinely surprising to students — being certified is not a general status.
• The 6G position is the one that matters. A pipe fixed at 45 degrees requires welding in every position on one joint, and a 6G qualification covers the widest range of other positions, which is exactly why employers test on it and why this programme teaches it.
• Certifications require continuity. Qualification generally lapses if you have not used the process within a defined period, and it must be maintained by documented use or re-testing.
• AWS Certified Welder and code qualifications under AWS D1.1 or ASME Section IX are the common frameworks; employers frequently qualify welders to their own procedures on hire.
• Take every test you are offered. Each additional qualification widens the jobs available to you, and they compound.
• The "C or better to continue" requirement is not a formality. In welding, a marginal pass means welds that fail inspection, and the programme's gate exists because the industry's gate is harder.
• Rule 11 applies — code editions and certification requirements change; verify with AWS and with the employer's own procedures.

⚠ Open-root pipe welding is a manual skill built by hours, not by understanding

• You cannot read your way to a root pass. The theory takes an afternoon; the hand takes hundreds of hours, and the 375 clock hours exist for exactly this reason.
• The root pass is the hard part. An open root has no backing — the weld pool is suspended over nothing — and the margin between insufficient penetration and burn-through is narrow and position-dependent.
• Fit-up determines the outcome before you strike an arc. Bevel angle, land thickness, root opening, and alignment must be consistent, and a bad fit-up cannot be welded well by anyone. Students consistently under-invest in fit-up.
• Position changes everything. The same joint requires different technique overhead, vertical, and flat, and in 5G and 6G you pass through all of them on one weld while your body position changes continuously.
• Get comfortable before you strike. Bracing, hand position, and being able to complete the movement without repositioning is most of the technique. Welders who are uncomfortable produce uncomfortable welds.
• Watch the puddle, not the arc. Reading the weld pool — its shape, its keyhole, its behaviour at the edges — is what experienced welders actually do.
• Cut your own coupons and look at them. Sectioning a practice weld and seeing the penetration teaches more in one minute than an hour of speculation.
• Learn to read your defects. Undercut, porosity, slag inclusion, and lack of fusion each point to a specific cause — amperage, travel speed, angle, cleanliness, or technique — and diagnosing your own weld is the skill that produces improvement.
• Consistency beats brilliance. The industry wants welds that pass every time, not occasional beautiful ones.
• Use every hour of open booth time available.

⚠ The money, the body, and an honest account of the trade

• Skilled pipe welding pays genuinely well, and there is a real and persistent shortage of qualified pipe welders nationally — the trade's workforce is ageing and replacement has been slow.
• The money is in the difficult work. Pipe, out of position, code work, shutdown and outage work, and travel all pay premiums, and plate welding on a bench does not.
• Overtime and travel drive earnings. Headline figures for welders often reflect long hours and per diem rather than a base rate.
• Work can be cyclical. Construction and outage work is project-based, and periods between jobs are normal — budget for them.
• It is physically demanding. Confined positions, heat, weight, and holding still under load for extended periods. Florida's summer heat inside welding gear is a serious and underrated factor.
• The body wears. Knees, shoulders, back, hands, and eyes all take load over a career, and welders who last are the ones who stretch, use positioners where available, and take the fume and heat protection seriously from the start.
• Plan a second act. Welding inspection (CWI), supervision, estimating, instruction, and quality control are where experienced welders move when the body wants a change, and they pay well.
• Florida's market is real — shipyards, power plants, water and wastewater infrastructure, aerospace fabrication, and marine — though the largest petrochemical and pipeline money is out of state, and welders who will travel earn more.
• Get your own rig later, not first. Mobile welding is a business as much as a trade; see this repository's DIG2510 guide on contracts, insurance, and self-employment tax.

How Florida course levels affect transfer

The first digit of an SCNS number denotes the year of offering, not transferability. Courses at the 1000 and 2000 levels transfer transparently between Florida public institutions, and 3000 to 4000 is unproblematic since both are upper division. The boundary that actually matters is 2000 to 3000, where lower-division credit generally cannot satisfy an upper-division requirement.

PMT0077C is a 375 clock-hour PSAV course carrying zero college credit, with a $1,505.90 lab fee — the largest fee recorded in this repository, and it reflects consumables, gas, and equipment time rather than administration. Ask exactly what it covers before purchasing anything separately.

Assessment is on produced welds — visual inspection, bend tests, and possibly radiography — and a C or better is required to continue into PMT0078C Advanced Welder 1B. There is no way to compensate for a weld that fails, which is the honest character of the trade.