YES! This is why it's SO important to keep this sort of stuff in schools.
Sliding compound miter saw is a magic tool.
Now just wait until you get a MIG welder and a bandsaw, you'll be UNSTOPPABLE and the world will suddenly look a whole lot different!
Sidenote: I'm the program director at a nonprofit where I teach/create curriculum. One of the workshops that I love teaching is a week long where we teach the following skills to a group of 12 kids:
Welding: learn to run a mig welder well enough to make art, furniture etc. Welding is easier than you think!
Woodworking: learn how to use a miter saw, and make 2x4s into smaller pieces and then reassemble them into larger pieces of different shapes!
Arduino programming: make lights blink on and off in exactly the way you want them to, and learn some C++ and core programming concepts in the process.
Laser cutting: learn how to take things out of your imagination and create beautiful things on the laser. Lasers always blow peoples' minds at how cool the the things they can make are, and how easy it is to use them.
These specific skills mean that these teenagers leave with a totally shifted perspective on the world around them. The experience you had realizing that the railing you wanted to fix was actually something that you can interact with and modify is what we're doing for these kids, but doing it with: things made of bits (computing), things made of wood, things made of metal, and things made on a computer (CNC). I'm really passionate about it. If you know of a group of kids that would enjoy this type of workshop, please email me!
It really is sad that most schools have discontinued these programs. I have a cousin who makes knives. When I visited his shop in Ohio last year, he commented that a lot of the workbenches and tools that he had in his shop were bought at auctions from schools getting rid of their shop programs. It’s a shame.
My high school was the regional hub for vocational training, so we had an entire wing devoted to these things. There was even a small restaurant and I remember one of the capstone projects for the year was actually building a house. Fortunately it has continued to be well-funded.
Unfortunately, an honors-level academic load meant there was no time in the schedule to take many of these classes.
35 years ago I had to argue quite a bit with my high school advisor to be allowed to take drafting. She was adamant that a “college bound” student shouldn’t take shop classes. I use things I learned in that class to this day (it was all hand drafting but there was an Apple II sitting in the corner with a primitive CAD program that I was allowed to play with towards the end of the semester)
Hah, my Engineering School in college required drafting courses (one dedicated hand drafting course, one dedicated CAD course) as low level requirements for every major, including Industrial, Chemistry, and Computer engineering students that didn't always know how/where it would come in handy (but there are indeed lessons applicable to everything). It's a general knowledge communication skill, even if you aren't communicating mechanical diagrams, there are still plenty of carry-over to all the other sorts of diagrams we all see in every field.
This is uncanny. I have the same exact story from 25 years ago.
Before freshman year, I had to sit down with my guidance councilor to select my electives. I chose Spanish and Drafting. She said both of those were a "bad fit for an honors student"; that I should take French and Art instead.
I acquiesced, not too happy about it but also trusting she knew what was better.
A few weeks later I got my schedule. Apparently French was booked up so I got Spanish. But still had to go to Art class.
I dropped that a week later and switched to drafting, which I did all four years of high school. The first two years were technical drawing and the next two were architectural drafting. This is when I convinced the teacher to let me fire up the 386s in the back of the room. They all had Generic CADD[0] on them, which remains one of my favorite CAD programs of all time. Simple, but wicked fast with two-key commands for everything. (i.e. "ZB" for zoom to box, "C3" for a 3-point circle, etc.)
My only saving grace there was that my dad was a Land Surveyor and made heavy use of AutoCAD. We had the full digitizer tablet and access to a color plotter.
I didn't care so much for the 2D stuff, but over time I taught myself a lot about modeling stuff in 3D. I blew people away in drama club one year when I showed up with a rendering of the auditorium, stage, and lighting locations for one of the plays.
I took am automotive technology class in highschool and my teacher was amazing at teaching students the art diagnostics and troubleshooting. The skills I learned from that teacher did far more to get me where I am today in my career (started out at the bottom ring of IT Support and have since moved up through Sysadmin roles and now in the dev process automation game) than any other class.
Ha! I was the only one taking AP-level everything and electronics and power mechanics as my electives!
The shop teacher was so grateful that he finally had someone super-interested in more advanced topics that I got to do extra projects he'd had on his wish list for years. One of my favorite high school memories and experiences.
Unfortunately I think a lot of kids would shy away from doing this today as it can hurt your GPA -- because of weighting, an A in an AP class is worth more then an A in a shop class.
So if a school is mostly focused on college-bound students, it's kind of natural that these programs have fallen away.
I'm old enough that I did basic shop stuff in middle school -- soldering, bandsaw, even a table saw. No way that would fly today.
Colleges don't care about weighted GPAs, only unweighted. Of course, they'd prefer if you take more advanced courses but they'd rather see that you perform well in the courses that you do take rather than struggle in courses that are too hard for you.
You touch on one of my frustrations with high school. In most schools, tracking means that you either take APs or you take classes that teach hands on skills. As if someone with a BA will never need to know how her car works.
It seems pretty obvious it died down as a result of the shift to knowledge economy. It would reverse if manufacturing & the trades resurged in importance.
If you are in the US and live near a Woodcraft store, many of them have dedicated training rooms with regular clubs and class schedules. 100% woodworking, but still valuable knowledge and experience. I know there's a pandemic on right now, but when we get back to mostly normal I suspect they will start their classes back up again.
See if your neighborhood adult school has any classes. I have taken a woodworking class in local adult school. Courses were done in the workshop of a high-school.
This is a really honorable and amazing occupation you've found for yourself and I'm glad folks like you are out there changing people's perspectives and lives. Do you have any resources you'd recommend for learning welding? That's been a skillset that I've wanted to pick up for awhile.
Just buy a welder. Seriously. The machine I learned to weld on was a lincoln 140, and the machines we have at our space are miller 210s (which are LUXURY imo).
There are probably thousands of videos on youtube that will show you how to use it, but here's the thing: if you use it wrong, who cares? You really can trial and error your way to it.
A $99 Harbor Freight stick welder, a cheap grinder, plus mask, gloves, long-sleeve shirt and what-not. Then go to a local metal supply place and ask if you can buy some scraps to practice welding---I ended up with a box of pieces of 1/4" steel plate for free. Technically, I should take them back to recycle when I am done, but I'm too ashamed of the horrible welds I did on them. I still can't scratch-start worth a damn.
Just be sure to watch some videos or read up on on how to do it safely.
I learned to weld when I was a kid, I was raised on a citrus farm by my grandparents and when you grow up on a farm you are by virtue a farm hand. My grandfather was past the age of "I want to learn new stuff" and a lot of modern parts for machinery where starting to be produced in aluminum, so my grandfather bought a TIG machine and I was told figure it out (I also learned how to rebuild automatic transmissions due to him not wanting to learn them). Anyways back then they did not really have spool guns for MIG machines so pretty much if you wanted to repair aluminum you needed a AC TIG machine or a DC TIG and had to run pure helium. We got an AC machine because helium is a lot more expensive than argon. Anyways I ended up becoming proficient at TIG welding really quick and honestly there is more involved (rods, gas, torches, etc) but after doing TIG/MIG/Stick I think TIG is the easiest process to actually learn the manual process of welding. To me it is far more natural than using a MIG torch or holding a stick clamp and using your finger to try to guide the stick due to the fact that stick requires some serious gloves to keep the heat at bay whereas TIG you can use very light kidskin gloves. The torch to me is the big part of where TIG shines as it is the most similar to using a pencil to draw. Learning to feed the rod takes some time, but it's not critical, with a TIG peddle you can slow down the weld to allow you time to synchronize feeding the rod. Finally TIG produces the superior weld in both strength and aesthetics the problem with it, is it is the slowest form of welding so it is frowned upon for production welding unless it is absolutely necessary such as welding exotic metals. That being said, I think it is a great process for hobbyist as it allows the most control over the process and provides the person welding with the ability to weld the greatest amount of different metals. I would not discount learning TIG if a person is interested in learning welding, especially if their interest lies in doing metal art or jewelry.
I would also recommend people look at China Mart welders for hobbyist use and possibly a multi-function machine, you get a lot of bang for your buck and there are some decent ones I personally have an Avortec AV6X, the welder is designed in the US, manufactured in China, quality controlled in the US and warrantied by the US company. It is a multi-function welder that does, TIG/MIG/Stick/Plasma and runs a 100% duty cycle. A similar offering from Lincoln on Miller would be upwards of 8k, I paid 2K for my welder. That being said, it is overkill for a hobbyist, one can get a decent AC TIG for under $600 and a combo AC TIG/Stick/Plasma for about $750. DC TIG machines can be had for a little over $200 but you have to run helium to do aluminum and they will not do stainless steel, titanium or any other exotic alloys which pretty much relegates them to common mild steel, but that is pretty much the same as MIG unless you spring for a spool gun to do aluminum on a MIG. Stick can do a variety of metals but it is really only good for industrial in the field welding as weld quality is the poorest out of the three and aesthetics are certainly the worst. One is not going to show off their stick welds, that is for sure.
Also for those looking into it, Miller has an app and website:
It takes all the guess work out of the welding process, you put in the process, the metal, the thickness and the type of weld (butt, lap joint, etc) and it spits out:
rod, gas flow, power settings, electrode, Torch Cup Orifice Diameter for TIG.
Wire size, gas flow, power settings, spool rate for MIG
rod, power settings for Stick.
Honestly this is 80% of learning to weld and nowadays you don't even have to go look it up in a book, you just put in the parameters and it spits out the variables you need. Basically all you have to do is learn manual process of welding.
Also follow up tip, welded metal does not look hot but it can be very hot far away from the weld. When learning try to not pick it up with you hands, use a welder clamp or some grips. Assume all metal is hot, but when learning you are inevitably going to pick one up, we all did it, we all do it. You learn quick to not trust that metal is not hot.
And another tip, for those of you that do look to get a machine if you are in the US don't buy a 120v welder, they will do the job for really thin metal but about the time you get the hang of welding you will say to your self I should have bought a 240v machine. You pretty much outgrow a 120v machine the moment you grasp the process. Don't get me wrong, they have their place like fixing panels on cars but they are very limiting on the thickness of metal you can weld.
Why specifically MIG and not something like flux core? Also, what resources do you recommend for learning to weld? I wish I could take a class on this but all I see is like two year old programs for becoming a certified welder and I am just looking to do it for random odd jobs.
Not OP, but I learned MIG at my local community college about 15 years ago. It was mostly pipe-fitters getting certified in the class and I was able work on whatever projects I wanted. I started with stick, then went to MIG, and then did a follow on class where I told them I just wanted to do Oxy-Ace. I think now they offer a more variety of classes, for people who want to do art and such.
If I recall, flux core is dirtier, and having a tank of argon on your cart isn't too expensive for a shielding gas. I lived in a studio and luckily my neighbors were cool with me running a chops saw.
I got a cheap stick welder and some plate and played around until I could kinda do it. Then I fixed my mailbox. It looks horrible, but it doesn't move anymore.
Most MIG machines can run flux-core wire without any problems. Gas-shielded welding (MIG/TIG) produces cleaner welds with less slag that needs to be cleaned off, but doesn't work outside with any wind.
Depending on your location, you may have a local makerspace, tool library, or similar; oftentimes places like that will have beginner classes on the cheap. Granted, that may all be on hold presently for Covid-19, but could be a nice thing to bookmark for later.
Edit: as an example from my own locale, the Denver (Colorado, USA) Tool Library typically has a beginner's welding class for $150: https://denvertoollibrary.org/upcoming/welding-101-fjbkt-k4g..., though they've suspended all in-person classes while the pandemic rages.
The ideal age is 13+ for that class. There have been some really bright kids that are younger who have done it, but that is the right age for the kids to get the most out of it.
Sliding compound miter saw is a magic tool.
Now just wait until you get a MIG welder and a bandsaw, you'll be UNSTOPPABLE and the world will suddenly look a whole lot different!
Sidenote: I'm the program director at a nonprofit where I teach/create curriculum. One of the workshops that I love teaching is a week long where we teach the following skills to a group of 12 kids:
Welding: learn to run a mig welder well enough to make art, furniture etc. Welding is easier than you think!
Woodworking: learn how to use a miter saw, and make 2x4s into smaller pieces and then reassemble them into larger pieces of different shapes!
Arduino programming: make lights blink on and off in exactly the way you want them to, and learn some C++ and core programming concepts in the process.
Laser cutting: learn how to take things out of your imagination and create beautiful things on the laser. Lasers always blow peoples' minds at how cool the the things they can make are, and how easy it is to use them.
These specific skills mean that these teenagers leave with a totally shifted perspective on the world around them. The experience you had realizing that the railing you wanted to fix was actually something that you can interact with and modify is what we're doing for these kids, but doing it with: things made of bits (computing), things made of wood, things made of metal, and things made on a computer (CNC). I'm really passionate about it. If you know of a group of kids that would enjoy this type of workshop, please email me!