Whether you’re in high school or are just a novice at welding, we’ve compiled a list of relatively simple projects that you should be able to tackle even with limited access to equipment. In fact, many of these barely requires more than a welder and grinder. Whether you have a little or a lot of equipment, take a look at these 20 projects.
The 20 High School Welding Projects Are:
1. Phone Stand
| Materials: | Angle Iron, Bolts, Paint, or Galvanized Coating (optional) |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Teenagers get a bad rap for using their phones too much, while the truth is that people of all ages are addicted. But if you use your phone, you might as well have something to rest it on! This little phone stand is made from pieces of angle iron that are notched according to the dimensions of your phone. Then bolts are added for the feet as well as the back so that it can rest tilted. It’s easy to make and shouldn’t take that long either.
2. Metal Shop Box
| Materials: | Plate, Nuts, Bent Nail, Threaded Rod |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Bandsaw, Torch, Vise, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
Who doesn’t need a good storage container? This is great not only for your shop but could even be used as a part of a desk organizer. This box is made from plate that is welded together. The lid is also a piece of plate attached to the box with a hinge made from threaded rod and nuts. The latch itself is made of a piece of thinner plate and a bent nail. This is a great project to practice your welding.
3. Slag Chipping Hammer
| Materials: | Plate, Chain Links |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Vice, Metal File |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Every welder needs a slag hammer. Even if you are only welding MIG and TIG right now, there will come a time when you need to chip some slag or knock off some dross from torch cutting. Half the battle with this project will be grinding down your piece of plate and using your metal file to achieve the desired surface of your hammer head. After you’ve completed that, it will be easier to weld the chain to the head as well as tacking the chain links together, so they don’t move.
4. Mini Vise
| Materials: | Steel Tubing, Flat Bar, Bolt, Nuts, Epoxy |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill, Tap |
| Difficulty: | Difficult |
This little vise will come in handy for any woodworking project you might have. It’s made of a piece of plate for the base, two pieces of tube on the plate, and a bolt that passes through one piece of tube steel as the clamp itself. The jaws are made of wood, so they’re easy to replace and great for working with softer material. Probably the most difficult part of the project is tapping the end of the bolt.
5. Fire Pit
| Materials: | Cylinder, Square Tubing |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Torch or Plasma Cutter |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
This fire pit is made from an old lawn roller and some pieces of tube steel for the legs. Even though this project has a specific type of cylinder, any cylinder or drum will do as long as it’s made of metal. The top of the roller is cut off, notched, and bent outward so that you can form a lid that will fit over the top. A plasma cutter is used to make several holes in the side of the cylinder for aeration. The tubing is notched so that they can interlock, and they are welded to the side to hold up the cylinder.
6. Hexagonal Planter
| Materials: | Sheet Metal |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
This little hexagonal planter is something you could hang in your living room to grow herbs or succulents. The design is pretty straightforward. It would serve you well to ensure that your layout of parts to cut is accurate before you start cutting.
Once you’ve got all your pieces, tack them up along the main hexagonal plate and weld them out. Ensure you’ve welded the bottom completely because you don’t want dirty water dripping all over your wall. Once you’ve finished welding, you can create a small hole with a drill on the backside of the planter so you can hang it.
- See also: 7 TIG Welding Projects to DIY Today (With Videos)
7. Welding Armrest
| Materials: | Pipe, Plate |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Welding is just as much comfort as it is technique. Processes such as TIG welding require you to have dexterity, accuracy, and stability to make good welds. Having something to lean against is tremendously helpful. This armrest is made of a piece of pipe attached to another piece of vertical pipe welded to a baseplate. The armrest can slide up and down along the vertical pipe and is tightened in place by a bolt on the arm.
8. Clamp Squares
| Materials: | Angle, Flat Bar |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
You can never have enough clamps or useful jigs. Keeping things square is essential when performing fit-ups. You can make the perfect jig with just a few small welds on pieces of angle and flat bar. All you have to do is clamp the workpiece to the angle. The most important aspect of this project is not necessarily the dimensions you cut your material but the angle at which you miter and tack them together.
9. Camp Grill
| Materials: | Plate, Round Bar |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Vise Bender, Rod Bender, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Difficult |
You might be wondering why exactly this one makes our list. It looks awfully complicated, doesn’t it? The truth is that it’s not terribly complicated, just very time-consuming. If you’re in a metal shop class or taking a class at a community college, you probably have access to a lot of the equipment shown in the video.
The main body of the grill is made from a large piece of bent sheet metal and capped off on either end by two other pieces. The grate is made from round bar. You’ll notice the fabricator does his due diligence in ensuring that the grate stays flat and makes the proper adjustments after distortion. You don’t want anything sliding off your grill!
10. Pencil Holder
| Materials: | Plate, Square Tubing |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Bandsaw |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Getting organized isn’t always easy. Sometimes it’s best just to start small, and this case is no different. Build this simple pencil holder from varied lengths of smaller square tubing which are then welded to a small piece of plate. It’ll spice up your desk and give it that rustic look, or maybe you need somewhere to put your soapstone in the shop. Either way, there’s no real reason not to build this since it’ll only take a few minutes.
11. Dice
| Materials: | Plate |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
This is an excellent project for beginner welders. If you’re tired of welding tee joints and butt welds, this will be a nice change of pace. The welds are entirely outside corner joints. They are trickier because it is easy to blow through the material, so it tests your technique and knowledge of machine settings.
Once you weld up the cubes, you will have a cool set of decorative dice. Just be sure to drill the holes before you weld, or you will trap gas and heat inside the cube leading to distortion.
12. Stool
| Materials: | Flat Bar, Nuts, Round Bar |
| Tools: | Brake Disc (or something for a radius), Welder, Grinder, Hammer |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
The first step is to take a piece of thin flat bar and bend it around a radius of the desired circle size. Once you’ve bent it, weld it together at the ends; this will become the outer rim of the stool. Fill the circle entirely with varying-sized hexagonal nuts (you can use the same size if you wish). Tack all the nuts together and to the flat bar as well. The legs made of round bar are then fit up in a fixture at an outward angle and secured with cross braces on all four sides.
13. Welding Gun Holder
| Materials: | Pipe, Square Tubing, Threaded Rod, Wingnut, Washer |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
Cut out one side of a small piece of tube steel and drill a hole in an adjacent side for a piece of threaded rod. This rod then goes through a nut into the hole. The nut is welded in place, and at the outside end of the rod, a wingnut is welded. A small gusset-type plate is welded on the backside of the tube. A piece of pipe, which is the holder itself, is welded to the gusset. The pipe is capped off on one end by a washer. This not only allows post-flow gas to escape but also for the wire to stick out if necessary.
14. Paper Towel Holder
| Materials: | Pipe, Horseshoes, Plate |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
If you have old horseshoes lying around then you’re in luck, especially if you like the rustic aesthetic. Butt up the toe ends of three horseshoes together and tack them together. Then place a piece of pipe that fits nicely in the center of the horseshoes and tack it to the horseshoes. You can either weld the end cap on the top of the pipe before or after. We recommend before to avoid spatter on your horseshoes.
15. Coatrack
| Materials: | Plate, Round Bar |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Rod Bender, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
If you’re looking at this video and wondering how bending the round bar into hooks is easy, hang on a second. Before you start building this coatrack, check out a quick tutorial here on making a simple rod bender.
The design for the coatrack in this video is optional. You could leave it square on the corners and simply buff off the sharp edges or make the design from the video. The big issue is to ensure that your hooks are bent enough so that they won’t let any coats slip off. When you drill your holes, ensure they are just 1/16 inches wider in diameter than your fasteners.
16. Minibike
| Materials: | Nuts, Coupling Nut, Bolt, Two Allen Wrenches (same size) |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
This would make a nice little decoration for your desk or a thoughtful gift for a bike enthusiast friend. The wheels are two hexagonal nuts connected by a bolt. Two Allen wrenches are tacked on either side of one nut for the handles. The video shows it being welded with Stick. If that’s all you’ve got, then it’s okay, but it will be easier if you have a MIG or TIG welder handy. These are small parts, after all.
17. Fitting Tool
| Materials: | Angle, Square Bar, Threaded Rod, Nut |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Sometimes when you are trying to fit up two pieces of plate side-by-side as a but joint, it’s hard to get the plates to come together flush and even. One is either higher than the other because of an uneven surface, or the material was just plain warped when it came out of the mill.
Either way, this little tool helps remedy some of that. It is small, so don’t expect miracles. For what it is, just a tiny piece of angle with a little clamp, it gets the job done!
18. Espalier
| Materials: | Angle, Plate, Square Tubing, Flat Bar |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Drill |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
The legs of this espalier are built from pieces of angle iron which are then welded to pieces of plate. This becomes the support for the entire structure. The posts are pieces of tube steel, and the cross beams are flat bar. The whole structure is then mounted to the wall with brackets formed from parts of flat bar that are bent and drilled. This project is especially suited to beginners because there is a high tolerance for precise measurements.
19. Helmet Hook
| Materials: | Round Bar |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder, Pliers or Rod Bender |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
Bend a piece of shorter diameter round bar around a radius so that it fits somewhat close (but not tight) around your gas cylinder. Then tack two to four pieces (the video shows four) of the same thickness round bar to the formed piece of round bar. These will become your hooks.
Once you are satisfied with the fit, bend your hooks with pliers or a rod bender. It shouldn’t be too difficult if your diameter is on the shorter side. This hook will treat you well and keep your helmet secure on your bottle cart.
20. Cowbell
| Materials: | Sheet Metal, Round Bar, Nuts, Hard Wire |
| Tools: | Welder, Grinder |
| Difficulty: | Easy |
This list needs more cowbell! The hardest part about this project for a novice will be cutting the pieces to the proper shape. Just be sure that they’re symmetrical and you’ll be okay. The clapper itself is made of a nut that hangs by a piece of wire (even welding wire from your MIG machine will work here). The round bar works as the handle after you’ve bent it.
Final Thoughts
We can’t vouch for the safety of all of the practices you’ve seen in these videos. Some people are using cutoff wheels without gloves and eye protection. The goal of these videos is to get you to understand the basic principles of fabrication. For best safety practices, always consult your equipment user manuals and use personal protective equipment.
Featured Image Credit: seeshooteatrepeat, Shutterstock
This post first appeared on Water Welders | Guide To Underwater Welding Salar, please read the originial post: here
