Electrical safety tips from three welding instructors

To reduce or eliminate the risk of electrical hazards in shops and classrooms or on worksites, welding equipment should be properly maintained, inspected on a routine basis, and used as intended. Aleksandr Kondratov/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Have a question or need advice on avoiding electrical hazards while welding? Ask a welding instructor.

After all, most have real-world experience outside of the classroom that can resonate with future or current fabricators. They also have experience teaching electrical safety principles to new welders every day. In other words, welding instructors might be the best resources to help fill in the blanks about electrical safety.

Mark Poirier, welding instructor, and Mike Brandt, welding instructor/program chairman, at Lanier Technical College’s Dawsonville, Ga., campus; and Karsten Illg, welding instructor and department chair at College of Lake County in Grayslake, Ill., shared with The WELDER some tips and stories to help welders prevent electrical hazards in the shop, field, or classroom. While these tips do not encompass everything about electrical safety, these educators hope welders young and old will take this information to heart.

Water and Welding

Everyone knows that water and electricity do not mix, but all welders, at one point or another, find themselves in a position where moisture is unavoidable.

This presence of moisture may come in the form of rain, high humidity, or sweat. Be mindful of where moisture is while working.

“Make sure that you're insulated, that the equipment's adequate for the job, things like that,” said Poirier. “Check for damaged parts, that they are replaced or repaired. Make sure welding machines are properly grounded, that gloves are dry with no holes in them. And just be mindful of the presence of water or moisture all the time.”

Personal protective equipment (PPE) is important, they added. Wear boots and gloves and have a poncho ready—anything that can reduce or eliminate moisture exposure. Do not wear moist or wet PPE.

Poirier, whose experience outside of the classroom includes time as an iron worker and pipe welder, said to bring extra pairs of gloves in case a warm environment causes sweaty palms.

On rain, Poirier said: “The thing is, you don't weld in the rain. You don't weld in standing water. You just don't. But like I said, sometimes there's no other way so you’ve just got to do it properly.”

Mind Your Equipment

Welding equipment should be properly maintained, inspected on a routine basis, and used as intended. Equipment condition can often be overlooked, but it is one of the most important things to look for, said Brandt.

Welding instructors have real-world and classroom experience that can prove insightful when teaching welders about electrical hazards and how to prevent them. South_Agency/E+/Getty Images

“I’ll tell students, ‘When you're dealing with electrical plugs and that that sort of thing ... I don't recommend that you're mindful of it, it demands you being mindful of it,’” stressed Brandt, whose past work experience includes racing, welding, and fabricating.

Student welders are trained to inspect equipment for any issues, added Illg. This ranges from easy-to-spot issues like a broken torch/gun or electrode holder, to more difficult problems like a small cut in a wire/cable cover that exposes the core.

The objective is to prepare students for anything thrown at them, including the fact that they may not be the only ones using the equipment in a welding lab or shop.

“When you’re the sole user of the equipment, you become very familiar with it. But in a training environment or in a manufacturing environment where you have multiple users and don’t have a personal workstation, you never know what the last user did to it,” said Illg, whose career includes work in motorsports, machining, and fabrication.

Avoid shortcuts while repairing or maintaining equipment, they advised. If necessary, contact a professional electrician to make a repair, Brandt added.

“One thing that I will say about repairs, replacement, or getting new equipment up and running is making sure that qualified people are doing the work,” he said.

“There's some things that you just shouldn't ever take for granted.”

Student Curiosity

New welders may not ask many questions about electric safety right away, but their level of curiosity changes as they weld more. Eventually, they begin to ask more questions and begin to ponder the how—as in, how do welders stay safe while fusing metal together using an electric current?

“A lot of them don’t know what questions to ask until they’re immersed in it,” Illg said.

The three teachers make safety a big part of their instruction, especially as students get introduced to new processes. Safety training comes in the form of videos, online work, quizzes, and curriculum.

At times, Illg has shared a 2003 story about a farmer who died while welding. A National Ag Safety Database report of the incident said the 44-year-old man died from electrocution while welding a feed bunker wagon.

Illg said this story is effective in reminding students—and even himself—that electricity should not be taken for granted.

“The reaction, man, is it gets quiet because students again understand they can use this equipment, but [they] may not understand that if the equipment is damaged and not maintained to how the environment changes, you can create a dangerous situation,” he said.

Helpful Tips

The three instructors shared a few other tips on reducing or eliminating electric hazards while welding:

• Do not use welding gloves for material processing.
• Do not use welding leads that are too small, damaged, or poorly spliced.
• Do not wrap cables around your body.
• Do not touch the electrode with bare skin if you are in contact with the work or the ground.
• Do not touch the work with your bare skin during the welding process.
• Do not use welding leads submerged in water.

The American Welding Society’s Safety and Health Fact Sheet on electrical hazards recommends the following:

• Read the instructions, labels, and manuals before installing, operating, or servicing equipment.
• Train welders and others involved in welding operations on safe electrical work practices according to the employer, OSHA 1910.332, and ANSI Z49.1.
• Do not work alone in electrically hazardous conditions.
• Do not touch electrode holders connected to two welding machines at the same time since double open-circuit voltage can be present.
• Connect the work clamp to the workpiece/metal, as close to the point of welding as possible.
• Ground the workpiece to a good electrical earth ground when required by ANSI Z49.1 or other codes.
• Do not touch an energized electrode while you are in contact with the work circuit.