VGCC Welding Students Get Look At Latest Equipment Of Industry

The Welding Technology program at Vance-Granville Community College is more than just classroom instruction and practicing welding techniques on the equipment available in the welding shop.

Program head/instructor Bill Jones takes every opportunity to expose his students to what’s new in the world of welding and what they may expect to see when they leave school and go out to work in their profession.

Such was the situation May 23 when representatives of Machine & Welding Supply Co. brought a mobile unit to Vance-Granville to demonstrate for the students the newest, computer-controlled welding machines. Mark Jeffries, regional manager for the Dunn-based company, and Ray Adams, sales representative from the Raleigh division, brought the equipment to VGCC.

“Welding, like almost everything, is moving to electronics,” Jeffries said, and these machines demonstrate the advantages of the new equipment.” The MIG, TIG and plasma-cutting welding equipment in the mobile unit are smaller and lighter and save space, Jeffries and Adams said. They are also more electrically efficient and heat up faster, thereby saving time.

The easiest thing to see for the welding students, who will finish the year-long VGCC program in August, came when they took a turn welding on the new machines. The spatter, or shower of sparks, most often associated with metal welding was virtually eliminated, the welders were able to get closer to their work, and the welds were so smooth they needed almost no clean-up.

“This new type equipment saves materials, and it saves a great deal of time in post-weld clean-up,” Jones said. “Our graduates are going to see a combination of the standard welding machines they have trained on and these electronic welders when they get jobs in industry.”

Jones said, “The welding skills of our graduates are easily transferable to the electronic welders.”

In the photo above, aWelding Technology student at Vance-Granville Community College tries out the computer-controlled welding machine brought to the college in a mobile unit May 23 by Machine & Welding Supply Co. representatives. Mark Jeffries, regional manager for the company, at left, supervises the trial while Ray Adams, sales representative, center, and Bill Jones, VGCC welding program head, at right, look on.