About
Four people, one microscope, a lot of opinions.
We started the bench in 2009 out of a corner of a structural fab shop that closed when the owner retired. We kept the microscope. The microscope kept us.
What we actually do
If a weld cracked and somebody's insurance carrier wants to know why, that's our job. If a fabricator needs PQR paperwork that will hold up under a serious AI review, that's our job too. We do metallography, hardness traverses, tensile and guided-bend tests, macro-etches, and the kind of plain-English write-up that a judge, a field super, or a first-year apprentice can all read without a translator.
We don't do finite element analysis. We don't do field NDE. We don't do lab work on anything we can't hold in two hands. If you need those, we know who to call — there are three shops we trust within a half-day drive and we'll pass the name along.
Why we publish a quarterly
Because most of what we learn at the bench is useful to somebody working a seven-to-three shift who will never hire a lab. The Quarterly is how we pay back the trade. Every article is written by whoever ran the test. No ghostwriters, no marketing review, no case studies dressed up as advice. When we're wrong we print the correction on the front page of the next issue, set larger than the original claim.
Issue 1 went out in January 2011 to 112 shops. Issue 37 ships next month to 900. We have never sold an advertisement and we do not intend to. The press bill comes out of the lab's operating account and it is, frankly, one of the better line items we have.
The crew
Renata V. — Principal, metallurgy
Thirty-one years in steel. Came up through a structural fab shop running flux-core on bridge girders, went back for the metallurgy degree in her thirties when her shoulder gave out. Runs the hardness rig, edits the Quarterly, sits for the depositions. Opinions about preheat are vigorous and have been known to fill an elevator.
Dell H. — Welding engineer
Still certified on SMAW, GMAW, GTAW, and FCAW — renewed every three years on his own dime because he thinks an engineer who can't strike an arc has no business writing procedures. Writes most of the field-notes columns. Keeps the Struers Accutom-100 aligned, which is more than anyone else here can say.
Pris K. — Bench technician
Runs the mounts, polishes, and etches. Nobody on this side of the Mississippi gets better grain contrast on a 4140 sample. Joined us in 2017 out of a community college materials program in Rochester. Teaches the Tuesday-evening etching workshop when a local shop sends an apprentice through.
Margo — Shop dog
Fourteen-year-old shepherd mix. Came with the building. See Back Page, Issue 37.
What the bench looks like
One 1,800-square-foot bay with a polished-concrete floor and a tall north window. A walk-in sample cage with two years of retained mounts filed by case number. An optical microscope older than Pris. A hardness rig newer than any of us would prefer. A sectioning saw that eats one diamond blade a quarter. Margo's bed, which is a folded moving blanket on top of an old induction-heater crate.
Coffee comes from a drip machine on a shelf above the macro-etch hood. The filter runs an hour late on Mondays because nobody trusts the timer anymore.