Handbook of Occupational Groups and Families		Classification Programs Division
Release Date:  August 2001		Section Thirty-seven of Sixty-six

    3700 - METAL PROCESSING FAMILY   

This job family includes occupations that involve processing or treating metals to alter their properties or produce desirable qualities such as hardness or workability, using processes such as welding, plating, melting, alloying, casting, annealing, heat treating, and refining.

Throughout the following information, an asterisk (*) stands for series with a published standard and a double asterisk (**) stands for series with a published flysheet.

Occupations in this family are:

3702 Flame/Arc Cutting

This occupation includes jobs involved in cutting metal, using gas burning or electric arc cutting equipment.

3703 Welding *

This occupation includes jobs involved in welding metals and alloys. The work requires a knowledge of electric, gas, and other welding processes such as electron beam welding, and the skill to apply these processes in manufacturing, repairing, modifying, rebuilding, and assembling various types of metal and alloy parts, equipment, systems, and structures such as buildings, aircraft, and ships.

3705 Nondestructive Testing

This occupation includes jobs involved in the nondestructive examination of metals, composites, ceramics, plastics, and other materials for internal and external structural defects, delaminations, corrosion, and moisture penetration using magnetic particle, liquid penetrant, eddy current, radiographic, ultrasonic, or other types of nondestructive test processes and equipment. The work includes equipment setup, operation, adjustment, and evaluation or interpretation of test readings or results within established parameters for acceptance or rejection. This occupation does not include jobs that primarily require: (1) journey level knowledge and skill of the work processes involved in producing or repairing the items or materials tested; or (2) technical knowledge of engineering, physical, or other sciences in the direct support of laboratory or research operations.

3707 Metalizing

This occupation includes jobs involved in dipping or spraying molten metal coatings, such as tin, zinc, or copper, or metal objects by hand or by use of equipment such as metal spraying machines or galvanizing equipment.

3711 Electroplating*

This occupation includes jobs involving the use of electrolytic and chemical processes to plate, coat, and treat surfaces of metals and metal alloys for purposes of protection, repair, maintenance, and fabrication of parts and equipment. The work requires a knowledge of the preparation, testing, and maintenance of various electrolytic and chemical solutions; and skill in controlling and using them in performing the processes required to prepare, plate, coat, or otherwise treat various types of surfaces.

3712 Heat Treating

This occupation includes jobs involved in heat treating metals in a furnace or preheated chemical bath to alter the physical and chemical properties of the metal to produce a specific degree of hardness, toughness, or strength by an established process of controlled heating and cooling; and/or operating an annealing furnace and a series of vats to anneal, treat, wash, and rinse metal components.

3716 Leadburning

This occupation includes jobs involved in burning (welding) lead and lead alloy parts in fabricating, repairing, and installing lead fixtures and equipment.

3725 Battery Repairing

This occupation includes jobs involved in disassembling, repairing, reassembling, and charging batteries used in aircraft, electric trucks, motor vehicles, and other types of equipment, including breaking down batteries (removing compound, connector, and cell groups), washing down and diagnosing extent of repairs needed, and repairing and/or rebuilding batteries according to diagnosis requirements (assembling new cell groups, replacing compounds and lead burning connections, and replacing or rebuilding terminal posts).

3727 Buffing and Polishing

This occupation includes jobs involved in finishing metal surfaces by buffing, polishing, deburring, burnishing, filing, grinding, and barrel tumbling, using handtool or powered equipment such as grinders, files, chisels, polishing wheels, and wire brushes.

3735 Metal Phototransferring

This occupation includes jobs involved in making metal templates, name plates, warning and informational signs, dial facings, switch covers, test plates, schematic drawings, and other items, using photographic methods to transfer drawings to light-sensitized surfaces of metal stock. (This process is used in metalworking operations; it is not used in printing or lithographic shops or in preparing conventional photographs for generalized use.)

3736 Circuit Board Making

This occupation includes jobs involved in making printed circuit boards for use in electronic assemblies by photosensitizing prepared laminate sheets, photoetching prepared pattern on laminate sheets, deep-etching circuits, and electroplating circuits as necessary.

3741 Furnace Operating

This occupation includes jobs involved in operating and controlling electric, oil, or gas-fired furnaces to melt ferrous, nonferrous, and precious metals or alloys for casting into ingots, bars, slabs, sponges, etc., and may include transferring molten metal to ladle and pouring metal into molds.

3769 Shot Peening Machine Operating

This occupation includes jobs involved in setting up and operating an air blast shot peening machine to harden or strengthen metal surfaces, e.g., the bending and twisting surfaces of landing gear struts, propeller caps, master rods, fulcrums, propeller shafts, and crankshafts. The work includes examining parts received to determine areas to be shot peened and to reject those with imperfections; setting up machine; making test runs on identical parts using Almen metal testing strips, and making necessary adjustments after test runs to obtain adequate peening prior to peening parts on a production basis; and checking and maintaining shot peening machine in operating condition.