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Our Programs: Welding Technology
Grand River Welding Institute is a post-secondary trade school in Missouri that has an emphasis on stainless steel pipe welding. GRWl’s welding program will consist of four major welding procedures to become a certified pipe welder. Students will be instructed by field-experienced personnel qualified by GRWl’s weld testing and field knowledge experience.
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The student/instructor ratio will be no more than 12:1 in the work training area (weld booths). Each student will have 1-hour of classroom training and 7 hours of hands-on training per day. All students will be orientated and OSHA safety trained during the first week of the program.
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Through our program, students will learn critical field safety, basic pipefitting knowledge, and 4 critical welding procedures used in the field today. All classroom instruction will be verbal, along with diagrams, example videos, and marker board example drawings.
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All students will be given designated welding booths in the shop area for hands-on training. All booths will be set up according to safety regulations as well as testing qualification regulations. Welding tables and welding machines will be advanced to up-to-date field advantages and procedures.
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All students will be graded by visual weld performance daily. Visual and number of welds performed will be recorded on a 1-5 scale. Any student who falls behind in the learning process will have time to make up or retest anytime during the last 2 weeks of the program. The grading chart is only to inform instructors of who needs more instruction to advance in the program, additional training will be assumed by the lead instructor. Students must maintain a D(1.0)60% passing grade to complete the program.
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The program's total hours is 800 hours. Classroom and lab time is included in this time frame. Retesting is also included within the 800 hours, retesting weld coupons will have a 5-hour time limit.
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The Four Major Welding Procedures
PHASE 1: Structural welding using 6010 and 7018 stick rods on a flat plate in 4 positions. (160 hours)
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PHASE 2: GTAW/SMAW tig root 70s and 7018 stick rod on carbon pipe in 3 positions. (280 hours)
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PHASE 3: GTAW tig welding ER309 stainless welding on carbon pipe in 3 positions. (160 hours)
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PHASE 4: GTAW tig welding ER308 stainless welding on 304 stainless pipes in 3 positions. (200 hours)​
We have added a new Sanitary tubing program that extends the training period by 3
weeks, this is an optional course that the students may enroll in. Students who come to our program on a full scholarship would be chosen to take this course based on attendance, work ethic, consistency, and will to learn. The sanitary tubing program is a much more tedious welding procedure used in numerous processing facilities around the globe. Sanitary by definition is a cleaner process for human consumption. Sanitary process piping is used in all facilities such as food production and process, pharmaceutical plants, dairies, and breweries. Having the skill to weld and fit this type of tubing leads to a more versatile welder. For example, when other work such as refining, and power outages slow down due to being seasonal work, sanitary production always seems to have a year-round performance in work such as expansions, shutdowns for repairs, and cleaning processes.
Adding this program to our curriculum not only sets us apart from every other welding
trade school but drives students to want to better themselves. Knowing that they must do well in the Master's course in order to continue on to the Sanitary course will give them the drive to work harder every day.
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*Additional 3 Week /120 Hour Course
