Welded a steel base for a standing piece last Thursday. Quarter-inch plate, good beads, let it cool slow. This morning I'm wiping it down and there's a hairline running about two inches from one of the welds.

Not structural yet. But it's there.

I keep going back and forth on whether to cut it out and re-weld or let it ride and see if it stabilizes. The piece it's holding is carved limestone, maybe 150 pounds. If the base gives, that stone hits concrete.

Part of me thinks I should have used a thicker plate. Part of me knows I've seen old street railings hold together with worse cracks for fifty years.

What's your rule on when you chase a flaw and when you leave it?