Almost Scientific

If you have any interest in learning about the fundamentals of welding and working with metal, taking a class from Alan will serve you very well. I have had teachers of all kinds for all sorts of various interests and I must say that Alan is a fantastic teacher at his craft.
I took Alan’s class so that I could gain the knowledge to work on various metal arts projects and build my own metal structures, whether they be shelves, frames, sculptures ect. I feel confident in my ability to start and finish a project of my own after taking the class. I am very interested in the manipulation of metals and Alan’s class was a great motivation and knowledge base for me.
I now have an understanding of tools to use and how to use them when working with metal, with everything from grinding to cutting, drilling and sanding not to mention how to bend and twist metal to my liking. Alan focused the lessons around a small project in which I could apply all of my skills so I got the opportunity to practice what I was being taught.
I was impressed with the thoroughness of Alan’s lessons and his patience. The one-​on-​one classes were crucial for me to focus and actually learn and ask questions whenever I wanted to. Alan is a master at what he does and to take a class from him is a great opportunity to learn skills from someone who truly loves what they do and wants to share what they know. Thank you Alan!

I had seen some of Alan’s work at Maker Faire a year ago, and recently had come across his website again. I’d been working with simple copper kinetic art, and had wanted to learn how to weld for a while so I could work on different types of pieces, but taking a MIG welding class didn’t seem like what I needed. I wanted to know about a variety of skills, then I could go deeper into those which fit the projects I wanted to work on, but I wasn’t even sure which skills I should learn first.
I’ve been a tinkerer, and worked a bit with wood, having done hundreds of different projects over the years, so I didn’t want a junior college shop class, but there were some things I knew nothing about. So, a teacher that could adapt to «yes, I know a bit about that» or «which end is this tool is the dangerous one?» seemed ideal.
Alan’s metalworking class looked like the right balance. A 1 – 1 overview of various types of metalworking, customizable to focus on the types of things you actually wanted to do, so you could decide which skills you could work on your own, and which you might want to get more training in.
I sent Alan a note telling him my interests, we arranged a phone chat to discuss what I wanted to learn, and how Alan could teach me the basics. We arranged a convenient schedule for the classes, and I anxiously awaited our first session.
The first session started by Alan describing a basic vocabulary of metals, words I knew, but didn’t know the differences between. sheet vs. plate, pipe vs. tube, how metal is measured and described, and how various metals behave. A perfect mixture of industrial information, and why metals behaved as they do when different things are done to them.
Some basic shop safety, an explanation of how the tool you were going to use worked, a specific description of what to do or not do with the tool at hand. Then, Alan would explain what we were going to do, gave a brief example of how to do it right, and what the results looked like, as well as common mistakes that are made, and I was putting test beads on some mild steel bar with a mig welder.
With each area we went over, a similar pattern of teaching was used. This is what we’re learning, I’d describe what, if anything, I knew about the skill or tool, and Alan would customize what we went over so I’d get the full experience, but would spend the majority of my time doing things I didn’t yet know how to do. Then, Alan would watch how I worked, what I took to, or what I was challenged by, and would have me work a bit more on things that I wasn’t quite getting.
Alan also spent the minimum amount of time showing how to do something, and would also have me do something that just wouldn’t work, so he could explain the common failure condition. Knowing that you learn from your mistakes, and guiding you into making the right ones that you’d eventually make on your own was the ideal teaching style for me.
I loved the section on tolerances and how to accurately measure, mark, fit, and test. Since I was planning to eventually make larger kinetic pieces, tolerances become very important when you’re fitting multiple objects and expect them to balance or mesh in a particular way.
The middle of the class is spent working through the steps of making a small project. That gives you a chance to learn how to design, measure, mark, cut, fit, prepare, place, assemble, and finish a piece. That’s a great way of understanding how all the pieces fit together, so to speak, and what you’ll need to do to make your own pieces, beginning to end.
The last session had a variety of areas we could go over, and given the things I knew I’d want to work on later, we talked through that and picked a priority, so we spent more time on the things I’d most likely use in the near future. I learned the concept of TIG welding, how to machine pieces, especially for fitting bearings, and different ways to use different metals to create bearing surfaces.
At the end of the course, I’d learned more than I thought I could during the relatively short class duration. Multiple ways of attaching metal, how different types of metal can be used together, how to prepare materials, how to design and lay out a project (and why that’s so important), how to use various tools to do different tasks (i.e. multiple ways of cutting, shaping).
If you’re interested in making things from metal, and want a great introduction to the variety of skills to make that happen, especially if you want to learn about why, not just how, I’d highly recommend spending time with Alan at Almost Scientific.