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Larry Jeffus |
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Author — Consultant — Garland City Councilmember District 4. |
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Welding |
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I first learned welding and metal working from my father and grandfathers as I helped them with projects around the farm. The first project my dad had me do all by myself was to weld fender extensions on our 1959 ¾-ton Ford pickup truck when it was converted to a dually so it could haul heavier loads.
I attended New Bern High School in New Bern, North Carolina. My high school had a very extensive industrial arts program where I learned woodworking, drafting, sheet metal, electricity, and welding. My senior year I entered the Industrial Cooperative Training (ICT) program where I went to school in the morning and worked as a welder in the afternoon. Working at the shipyard as a welder helped me develop and expand my welding and fitting skills.
After graduating from high school, I studied industrial arts at Hiwassee College in Madisonville, Tennessee with the goal of becoming a shop teacher. I took courses in mechanical drawing, architectural drawing, and wood shop. During my first year in college, I worked on a dairy farm where I repaired silage trailers and welded on lots of other stuff that had either broken or worn out. In the following year I started welding in the afternoons and weekends at Monroe County Welding. It was the only welding shop in this small farming community. I honed my welding, fabricating, and fitting skills on jobs ranging from repairing all types of agricultural equipment and fabricating trailers, to building up idler wheels on bulldozers. The work was diverse, so I learned to weld on and repair steel, cast iron, aluminum, stainless, and pot metal. (Pot metal is a non-specific alloy of inexpensive, low-melting point metals that are often used to cast carburetors, small brackets, and handles found on tractors and farm equipment.)
After graduating from Hiwassee College with an Associate degree, I enrolled in the Industrial Education program at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. I took some more shop classes with my basic education courses. During the summers, I returned to Madisonville and worked as a welder-mechanic at Clifford Thomas Foreign Car Shop. I did some engine and transmission work but mostly did auto body repair and restoration welding on MG TD and MG TC classic cars. I learned the art of leading to repair dents in body panels; today we use body putty.
The year between earning my Bachelor of Science degree and starting graduate work I taught shop in Rosamond California. My parents owned a farm just outside this small desert farming community. In addition to the never-ending welding jobs on their farm I took odd jobs fixing irrigation pumps, farm equipment, and the occasional auto body welding repair.
Returning to Knoxville for graduate work, I worked weekends at Clifford’s shop and took on odd jobs in several welding shops and did some red iron structural steel construction work in Knoxville.
Low on funds and given an opportunity to move to New Hampshire for a high paying teaching job, I left my masters program before completing my thesis. Eventually, I wound up teaching welding at Manchester Vocational College in Manchester, New Hampshire. Later, I moved to Texas to take the Welding Department Chair position at Eastfield College in Mesquite, Texas.
During my welding career, I have welded on almost every type of metal in thicknesses ranging from a few thousandths of an inch to several inches. I am a proficient welder with OFW, OFC, TB, SMAW, FCAW, GTAW, SAW, PAC, RW, SW, and other manual, machine, semiautomatic, and automatic processes.
In 1978, I started an agricultural equipment manufacturing company in Commerce, Texas. My primary product was round bail-handling equipment, although we sometimes did a little repair welding. Over the years, in addition to welding for a variety of business and industries, I have welded on projects for all of the United States Armed Services and one project for NATO. In the early 90’s, I wrote all of the welding procedure specifications (WPS) for a local drill equipment manufacturer and did all of the testing of their new welding employees.
From time to time, I have been asked to testify as a welding expert in legal cases involving injury or weld failures. |
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Contact Info. |
