Staggered intermittent fillet weld symbol

A staggered pattern is an intermittent fillet on each face of the joint, with the two patterns shifted relative to one another so the segments alternate down the joint. The information content is the same as any intermittent callout — size on the left, length and pitch on the right — but it appears twice, once above and once below the reference line.

The offset itself is carried by how the two triangles are drawn rather than by a number. When the symbol above the line is shifted along the reference line so it does not sit directly opposite the symbol below it, the pattern is staggered. When the two triangles line up vertically, the segments are meant to be opposite each other. That is the single visual cue, and it is easy to miss on a busy drawing or a poor scan.

The shift on the part is normally half the pitch, which places each weld opposite the middle of the gap on the far side. Designers reach for the arrangement to spread heat input along the joint, keep distortion down on long thin members, and put weld metal where it does the most good without paying for continuous fillets on both faces.

Both sides usually carry the same size, length, and pitch, and when they do not, treat them as two separate instructions and lay out each face on its own. If the drawing needs the stagger to start at a particular end or feature, expect a note beside the symbol, because the notation itself does not encode a starting reference.