Found out that welding on galvanized steel can give you metal fume fever pretty quick

I was reading through an old safety manual from 2018 at the union hall and it said you can get sick from just 30 minutes of welding galvanized without proper ventilation, has anyone else run into this on a job site?

3 comments

3 Comments

michaelgrant1mo ago

Wondering if the zinc coating on newer galvanized steel is even worse than the old stuff.

mark_ward1mo ago

The 2017 batch I tested from a big box store had the zinc flaking off in sheets after one winter. @michaelgrant you gotta see that stuff up close it looks like cheap spray paint. The old stuff from the 80s would at least turn into that ugly gray patina first before it failed. I stripped a piece of new stuff with vinegar just for fun and the coating was paper thin compared to what I remember. They really cheaped out on the coating process somewhere in the last 20 years.

kaigibson1mo agoMost Upvoted

Coating was paper thin" nailed it @mark_ward. I had the same issue with some fence posts I put in around 2019. After one season you could see rust spots popping through where the zinc just wore off. I ended up hosing them down with cold galvanizing spray from the auto parts store just to get another year out of them. The old stuff my dad still has on his barn from the 70s is practically indestructible still. It's a shame they ruined a perfectly good product line to save a few cents per sheet.