going self employed

[barneybrendan]

I think that in the new year i am going to do some formal welding training and go self employed as a mobile welder.At the moment i can mig and mma ,but would love to tig as i have never tried it.Mig welding is my main thing at the moment and i do a fair bit of it either vehicle repairs or general fabrication.As it is something i have a passion for i think i want to take it further.I already have a vivaro lwb hightop van/workshop and mig welding equipment.

We have a lot of quarries around here and a major boating industry plus rural farming community,three of the main welding incomes after vehicle repairs.Prices for welding have shot up in this area over the last couple of years.This i think is due to the increase in price of consumables for instance boc prices going up every year.As i will be totaly mobile my overheads will not be high and im not a greedy person so i should do well.

All i need to find out now is what qualifications i need.I think a basic nvq would cover any basic welding like vehicle repairs and general fabrication ,but for heavy work as in quarries i think i would need some sort of codeing.So lots of googling now needs to be done to find out exactly what i need to do.

As for the self emplyment side of things that would be straight forward as i used to own a fishing vessel which i worked for some years.I always kept my own books so may only need some sort of refresher course for the day.

ANyway thats enough dribbling on,but if any of you have experience in codeings ect im all ears.Also any descent welding machines to think of mainly tig as i love my kempy mig at the moment.

[edge]

Good luck with it all fella.

[mark newman]

That will be the best move you can make , low tax bills and cash jobs .

[barneybrendan]

the thing is we dont need loads of money and as our kids are now all in full time education Lisa wants to go back to caring for the elderly and get her nvq's.So me going self employed would be the best move especially doing something i could easily do all day without fazzing me.

[peter richards]

ive been in the welding / fabricating industry for years before i did my back in , coding is everything if you want to get into serious welding MMA and mig as you said pretty much easy for domestic welding , tig a different ball game , i used to specialise in stainless steel pipework fabrication and have worked with some superb tig welders but they have been at it for 20+years , so i think its not going to be an overnight thing with the tig , i might be wrong you could be a natural , but still will need the certs if you want to get on any site, and be prepared to do tests in full position

[barneybrendan]

stainless work down here is mainly aimed at the boating world and they are charging a lot of money.When i had my crabber i got a quote for stainless rails and a cow catcher on the back £3500.There was no way i was going to pay that ,so i bought all the marine grade stainless and miged it all for a mere £400 in materials.It took me 2 days to build it all on the boat ,some mark up hey and that was a fiew years ago now.I miss having the boat at times though but that went to the orkney islands and is still going strong i think as the guys ude it for scallop diving.