Practice Welding

Finish Keep the Change and Wade moves back to his own yard. Walk in and he will offer you 10,000 Hours; accepting it hands you six Scrap Metal and opens the workbench.

He hands over all six pieces or none. Scrap stacks three to a slot, so six pieces take two inventory slots — if you have not got room for all six he will tell you to make room and come back, and nothing is handed over or started until you do. Those six are his to give and don't count against what he'll sell you in a day.

Before you start, pick how many welds to run: it starts at one, the minus and plus buttons change it by one, and Max jumps to as many as your scrap pays for. A number of welds means whole welds — ten sections each — and the bench shows the scrap, time, and Welding XP the run adds up to. If a half-finished weld is waiting on the bench, it counts as the first of them.

As each weld finishes the next one you chose begins, taking two more scrap, and the bench stops on its own after the last. It keeps going while you are away from the screen, the same as any other work. If your scrap changes before you press Start and the number you picked no longer fits, the bench tells you how many it can run now rather than quietly running fewer.

Stop whenever you like. The half-finished weld stays exactly as it is, and so does the scrap you already spent on it — resuming continues that same weld and costs nothing, even with no scrap left at all. Walking away from the yard stops the bench the same way; you cannot weld from the road.

If the scrap somehow runs short before the run is done, the bench finishes the weld in progress and stops on its own, saying so. Getting more does not start it again — that is your call.

If you would rather the weld on the bench finish without another one starting after it, use Stop After Current Weld instead of an ordinary Stop, even partway through a run of several. It lets that weld run to completion — full XP and output, same as always — then leaves the bench clear instead of spending scrap on the next one. It works whether the weld is currently running or already Stopped partway through.

There is only one Workbench, and it holds one piece of work at a time. An unfinished practice weld — one whose scrap is already spent — counts as occupying it, even after you have Stopped it. Take on a paying Work Order and you will be asked to finish that weld first, or to clear the bench with Stop After Current Weld. It works the other way too: a client's job on the bench means no fresh practice weld until that job is finished.

Wade sells Scrap Metal at 4 Credits a piece out of the yard, up to 12 a day, and buys spare scrap back at 1 — see Credits and trading.

Slag is yours to keep or throw out: the bench has a setting for it, applied as each weld finishes. Bix pays 1 Credit apiece for Slag in town, so an 8-Credit weld can return 2 if you keep both and sell them. If you keep Slag and run out of room for it, the overflow is thrown out rather than stopping the weld. Scrap stacks three to a slot, so using two pieces only frees a slot for Slag when it empties a stack.

There is a beaten-up terminal in the corner of the yard, and it is not just scenery any more. Once you are good enough with a torch, it is where the paying jobs come in — see Work Orders for how the board works.