Piping Fabrication, Erection & Spooling

This course contains the use of artificial intelligence.

▸ Piping is designed in an office and won or lost in a fabrication shop.

A piping system that is fully analysed, correctly specified and beautifully drawn still arrives on site as several thousand spools that have to be cut, bevelled, fitted, welded, examined, transported, lifted, connected, supported, tested and handed over with records. That work is where the schedule goes, where the cost goes, and where the quality problems are made.

It is also the part of piping engineering that is almost never taught. Engineers arrive on site able to run a stress analysis but unable to say why a spool break was put where it was, what a field weld actually costs compared with a shop weld, why the fit-up they are looking at will not produce an acceptable root, or what has to be in a test pack before a system can be pressurised.

This course covers the whole route from isometric to handover — spooling and spool break selection, material control and traceability, cutting and end preparation, fit-up, welding processes and qualification, heat treatment, NDE and acceptance, erection and supports, test packs, pressure testing, cleaning and the fabrication data book.

▸ Written from the shop floor and the pipe rack

Every topic is treated as a decision somebody has to make with consequences somebody else lives with. Where the spool break goes decides the field weld count. The field weld count decides position welding, scaffolding, weather exposure and repair rate. The repair rate decides the schedule. The course follows that chain rather than presenting fabrication as a list of requirements.

Quality is treated the same way. Examination requirements under ASME B31.3 depend on fluid service, and the course explains what that means in practice — what gets examined, what gets accepted on certificate, what the repair and re-examination cycle does to progress, and what the records have to show at the end.

Five focused sections, worked through in an afternoon.

▸ What you will master

• Follow the full route from design isometric to installed, tested and handed-over pipework

• Decide spool breaks for transport, handling and access, and understand what each break costs

• Read a fabrication isometric — bill of materials, cut lengths, weld numbering and spool marking

• Make the shop versus field welding case on cost, quality and schedule rather than habit

• Run material receipt, identification and traceability, including positive material identification

• Specify cutting, bevelling and end preparation, and recognise the preparation that will not weld out

• Assess fit-up and alignment against ASME B31.3 tolerance, and know what poor fit-up does to the root

• Select welding processes by material, position and quality requirement, and control them through WPS, PQR and welder qualification

• Apply purging, preheat and post-weld heat treatment correctly, including local PWHT in the field

• Build test packs, run hydrostatic and pneumatic testing safely, and close out the fabrication data book

▸ Who this course is for

• Piping and mechanical engineers moving from design into construction and site work

• Construction, field and area engineers responsible for piping installation

• Quality, welding and inspection engineers controlling fabrication and examination

• Project and package engineers managing fabrication subcontracts and progress

• Commissioning engineers building test packs and taking systems over

• Graduate engineers heading to site for the first time

▸ The knowledge that separates office from site

On a construction project the engineer who understands fabrication is the one the site takes seriously. Knowing why a spool cannot be lifted into place, why a weld will be rejected, or why a test pack cannot be closed is the difference between issuing instructions and solving problems.

▸ Why learn it here

Taught by a Chartered Engineer (CEng MIMechE) with over fifteen years delivering safety-critical projects in oil, gas and energy infrastructure — from the perspective of someone who has had to make a drawing become real pipework on a schedule.

Fabrication practice varies between ASME and European qualification routes, between contractors and between owners, and this course says so throughout. Where something is genuinely governed by ASME B31.3 or ASME IX it is identified as such; where it is contractor practice, project procedure or judgement, that is said plainly rather than presented as a code requirement.

This course is independent training and is not affiliated with, endorsed by or accredited by ASME, ISO, the Pipe Fabrication Institute or any fabricator, and it does not reproduce clause text, tables or figures from any standard.

▸ What you get

• Structured on-demand video across 20 focused lessons and five sections

• Section quizzes throughout and a final exam

• A downloadable spool break decision guide covering transport, handling and field weld cost

• A downloadable fit-up and pre-weld inspection checklist

• A downloadable test pack contents and close-out checklist

• Lifetime access on mobile and TV, and a certificate of completion

• Udemy's 30-day money-back guarantee

▸ No fabrication or welding background is required — the workflow is built up from the isometric onwards, and any engineering, technical or construction background is enough to follow the course.

Enrol now and understand what happens to your drawings after they are issued.