Certified Welding Inspector

[viperfang216]

I was wondering if anybody knows what it takes to be a certified welding inspector? I heard you have to have so many years of welding exp. and they get paid around $80,000 a year. Any info?

[boilerman79]

AWS has a class on becoming a CWI.Alao i think Hobart has a class also.

[Brainfarth]

I’ve talked to CWI’s in the past but never inquired about their pay. Then I talked to some people that said that some company’s only pay from 12 to 15 bucks an hour for the position. These company’s will also pay for the certs ( http://www.aws.org/certification/CWI/ ). From what I have gathered about CWI’s, it is best to be independent. But to do that you are going to pay quite a few dollars for your certification.

[Engloid]

Well, I can speak from experience:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/engloid/cwi.jpg

There's courses you can take that are geared at one thing...passing the test. They will be like one week seminars that will cost you in the thousands. At the end of the week, you will then be tested.

When I got mine, my company set it up. They paid for the cost, and had a teacher come to the office and teach us 2 nights a week for 14 weeks, I think it was. At the end, we had to pay the $400 test fee. If we passed, we were reimbursed for the test and got another $1/hr. We were not required to perform any extra duties though, which was nice.

I think you are supposed to have 5 years experience in the welding field. but it could just be 5 years in metal fabrication, not specifically welding. I'm sure the link Brian gave you will have plenty more details.

As for pay, it's not really goo din my area due to low demand...but if I work on my own, I get $45/hr.

[mokinho]

There are several types of certification in this field:
AWS-Certified Structural Steel Inspector
AWS-Certified Associate Welding Inspector
AWS-Certified Senior Welding Inspector
AWS-Certified Welding Inspector

The Associate Welding inspector criteria is:
CAWI Requirements:

High school graduate or equivalent - refer to QC1-96.
An 8th grade education, with a minimum four years work experience.
A minimum of six years work experience, if less than an 8th-grade education.

Go to the following web site and check out the link the salary survey link. I think this will help you in finding out how much an inspector makes.

http://www.pqndt.com/