Typical Costs for Welded Fittings

[Saboral]

Can anyone give me some info on the cost of welded fittings from a local welder? I'm tired of dealing with the seals on my weldless fittings and their twisting and turning. I want something solid. Additionally I really want to put a tangential return in my boil kettle.

Anyone had this done on their keggles?

 

[Bobby_M]

About $50 per vessel to make a sugary pitted welds. Good clean back shielded welds? You can't afford it because those guys have more projects than they can handle. You have a better shot at silver soldering our pull through bulkheads or switching over to properly designed weldless bulkheads. The latter is more applicable if the holes you have are not larger than 13/16".

 

[Saboral]

Properly back gassing isn't all the hard, I could set it all up I just don't have the confidence in my tig welding to attempt it. My welds wouldn't be clean enough.

 

[Bobby_M]

It's not hard but it's amazing how many welding "professionals" don't know about it or care enough about the job to do it. I guess it's not hard to understand since so many welders are tasked with functional structural welds or building railings. Sanitary and food handling welding is a specialty skill that few get into.

 

[Saboral]

I've always wanted to buy a tig machine and get ahold of some scrap stainless to practice. I'd love to learn it, maybe open a vendor online and do welding at a reasonable price for homebrewers.

 

[SpikeBrewing]

Pretty much what Bobby said. $50 will give you a weld you most likely won't be happy with.

Welding thin SS with a purged full penetration weld is very difficult. It takes a very skilled welder, special tooling for back purging and many hours setting up a welder to give you the correct amount of heat and penetration. Simply put it's not something a hobby welder would be able to do.

If you're looking to DIY something we'd recommend Bobby's silver solder fittings. We've heard too many horror stories about kettles/kegs being ruined by welders that can weld stainless with "no problem"....

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

It's not hard but it's amazing how many welding "professionals" don't know about it or care enough about the job to do it. I guess it's not hard to understand since so many welders are tasked with functional structural welds or building railings. Sanitary and food handling welding is a specialty skill that few get into.

Lets be honest though, in what world does a sanitary weld actually matter in homebrewing? We arent subject to the FDA.

HLT - Never see's anything but water
MLT - Preboil so who cares
BK - Boil kills everything

Im not saying a sugar **** weld, just a standard professional weld thats not back gassed and is hit with a angle grinder to clean up and smooth out any imperfections so that you dont rust. None of my 12+ fittings were sanitary welded, but then again they were done by a friend with 15-20 years stainless welding experience as his career. We just taped some foil over the backside of the hole as he instructed and he welded away and they all came out great and baby butt smooth on the inside after a few minutes with a various grit grinders


That said OP your looking at a lot, my LHBS i think had a welder doing them for $50 a weld (included drilling)

 

[Bobby_M]

I'm not even talking about sanitary welds, just something that doesn't elicit regret. Most welded pots people bring in look like a trailer hitch repair done with a stick welder in the dark. I would put my $15-20 weld less fittings up against 99% of the welds I come across.

 

[berrywise]

I'm not local to you but I have paid 50 dollars per fitting. This was from someone with extensive background in sanitary stainless steel welding. I've been extremely happy with everything my welder has done for me.

 

[Saboral]

Is your welder taking any vacations to the wonderful state of Virginia.

 

[cyberbackpacker]

~$60 an hour is the going shop rate charge around here.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

I'm not even talking about sanitary welds, just something that doesn't elicit regret. Most welded pots people bring in look like a trailer hitch repair done with a stick welder in the dark. I would put my $15-20 weld less fittings up against 99% of the welds I come across.

True enough, and i would too. Im trying to convince my friend who did my pots who is out of work that he needs to start doing this welding on the side he could make some good cash.

 

[SpikeBrewing]

Lets be honest though, in what world does a sanitary weld actually matter in homebrewing? We arent subject to the FDA.

HLT - Never see's anything but water
MLT - Preboil so who cares
BK - Boil kills everything

Im not saying a sugar **** weld, just a standard professional weld thats not back gassed and is hit with a angle grinder to clean up and smooth out any imperfections so that you dont rust. None of my 12+ fittings were sanitary welded, but then again they were done by a friend with 15-20 years stainless welding experience as his career. We just taped some foil over the backside of the hole as he instructed and he welded away and they all came out great and baby butt smooth on the inside after a few minutes with a various grit grinders


That said OP your looking at a lot, my LHBS i think had a welder doing them for $50 a weld (included drilling)

It's not a matter of getting an infection on the hot side. It's a matter of doing things the correct way. A non-purged SS weld will look like the below weld. You can grind it clean but the damage has been down. All the chromium has been blown out of the area and you no longer have a corrosion resistant material; it will rust over time. All the Chinese welded kettles are done this way and we've seen a lot of them have issues down the line.

True enough, and i would too. Im trying to convince my friend who did my pots who is out of work that he needs to start doing this welding on the side he could make some good cash.

It looks like the inside was not back purged. Again this isn't correct and can cause issues down the line. Now for the DIY brewer this will be good enough but as a company it wouldn't be acceptable.

 

[-CHRIS-]

What process was using to create that weld? To me it looks like no shielding gas and way too much current. I have been MIG welding some stainless steel structural tube without back gassing and my welds don't look that poor on the backside.

Chris

 

[SpikeBrewing]

TIG welded without back purging. Welding two similar tubes is very different than welding a thick coupler to much thinner SS sheet metal.

Again we have seen too many botched weld jobs and people coming to us because they had to scrap their other brand new kettles because they were ruined by "a buddy with a welder" or a guy that can weld stainless "no problem". Just be careful!

 

[Bobby_M]

Our motives will be deemed suspect because you sell welded pots and I sell weldless fittings. The truth is that the market for both products exist with or without our warnings. I will continue to hear the horror stories and apologize that there isn't much that can be done. I have drilled some out to 1-3/8" and silver soldered the TC flange but that only works for locals.

My best advice is to ask to see any stainless projects they may be working on or bring them a coupling and an old scrap pot as a test.

 

[Hamaki]

I stumbled on a guy on CL a few years back that offered custom keggles with two welds for $120 apiece and he provides the kegs. Any additional welds were $20 each if done at the same time. I bought three and am very happy with them. Nice, clean welds inside and out. Seeing what's posted here I guess I was pretty lucky. I haven't seen him advertise for awhile, though.

 

[SpikeBrewing]

Our motives will be deemed suspect because you sell welded pots and I sell weldless fittings. The truth is that the market for both products exist with or without our warnings. I will continue to hear the horror stories and apologize that there isn't much that can be done. I have drilled some out to 1-3/8" and silver soldered the TC flange but that only works for locals.

My best advice is to ask to see any stainless projects they may be working on or bring them a coupling and an old scrap pot as a test.

This is great advice. Ask them to weld a test fitting to a piece of 20 gauge stainless. If they can't do it on a test piece they shouldn't be trusted with a $200 kettle.

 

[cowboy1]

Is your welder taking any vacations to the wonderful state of Virginia.

Where in Virginia Saboral? Might be able to hook you up.

 

[Saboral]

Where in Virginia Saboral? Might be able to hook you up.

Warrenton, but I drive back and forth to FBurg regularly.

 

[MrNatural]

I stumbled on a guy on CL a few years back that offered custom keggles with two welds for $120 apiece and he provides the kegs. Any additional welds were $20 each if done at the same time. I bought three and am very happy with them. Nice, clean welds inside and out. Seeing what's posted here I guess I was pretty lucky. I haven't seen him advertise for awhile, though.

Was that the guy out of Sonora?

 

[cowboy1]

Warrenton, but I drive back and forth to FBurg regularly.

You are about 2 hours from me. What exactly are you needing to have welded up. I can show you some of my stuff if you are interested. With the work load at my full time job it may take a month or so before we could get it. We can do about any custom work you would want

 

[Saboral]

I have about 7 - 1/2" 304 stainless couplings I'd like to weld into my keggles. One of which would be a tangential port on my boil keggle.

 

[Hamaki]

Was that the guy out of Sonora?

That's the guy. He mentioned there is someone in Sacramento area who is a professional sanitary welder that does homebrewer jobs on the side. I've seen his ads on a more regular basis than the guy in Sonora.

 

[Beernip]

I learned a long time ago that welders are artists. Any schmuck can paint you a mural but that doesn't mean you want to stare at it without slitting your wrists. I'm in need of a welder again and my previous guy was great. $50 bucks and a perfect welds. Of course he realized what he could do and moved and now welds commercial brew tanks full time and doesn't have the spare time and is making enough $$$ that he doesn't want the side work.

 

[Hamaki]

I learned a long time ago that welders are artists. Any schmuck can paint you a mural but that doesn't mean you want to stare at it without slitting your wrists. I'm in need of a welder again and my previous guy was great. $50 bucks and a perfect welds. Of course he realized what he could do and moved and now welds commercial brew tanks full time and doesn't have the spare time and is making enough $$$ that he doesn't want the side work.

 

[lupulinaddict]

That's the guy. He mentioned there is someone in Sacramento area who is a professional sanitary welder that does homebrewer jobs on the side. I've seen his ads on a more regular basis than the guy in Sonora.

What's up 108 Brewers!!

I just had that guy weld my pots. He stills does it and still does posts from time to time. He said he gets a lot of business from cl, too much, so he has to try to scale it back from time to time. I actually saved his number one time he posted a while back.

To op....
He charged me $30 per weld. That includes a half or full coupler. $40 for a triclamp fitting welded on and I think it was $35 or $40 for the coupler with male outside threads and female inside threads for a ball valve. The only problem is he is in ca. They look like good welds to me...but I'm not as experienced as spike or bobby. Good luck.