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LINKING PEOPLE, JOINING NATIONS
fields. The Houdremont Lecture, commemorating Prof. Edouard
Houdremont (Germany), was an opportunity for an important
address at an Annual Assembly International Conference by a
distinguished person in a certain field associated with welding
and its processes. The Houdremont Lecture in 1994 by Prof.
Dr-Ing. Paul Drews from the European Centre of Mechatronics,
Aachen, Germany, provided an ideal opportunity to raise attention
to latest research developments, including the increasing
impact of microelectronics and information technology on
welding engineering, as well as the design processes that
were substantially influencing the move towards higher
levels of productivity, weld quality, flexibility, functionality, operational precision and cost-
effectiveness in welding.
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The Portevin Lecture is also given at International Conferences
associated with Annual Assemblies, on alternate years to the Houdremont Lecture. This
lecture, also by an invited expert, was established to commemorate Prof. Albert Marcel
Portevin (France) who was an outstanding researcher in most areas of metallurgy and a
founding Vice-President of IIW.
Many of the microjoining, or microwelding, processes can be traced
back to the 1950s when a capacitor discharge machine was introduced
for welding of orthodontic appliances. Microjoining received a further
boost when thermocompression of wire bonding was developed by Bell
Laboratories in 1957. These techniques were the forerunners to microjoining
applications commonly used today with processes such as electron beam
welding, and having applications in macro-, micro- and nano-scale joining
technology because of microjoining’s precise beam quality and associated
integrated controls.
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Resulting from such innovations, many important
advances in welding technology have subsequently been associated with
nanotechnology and theminiaturisation of components and systems, essential
for the manufacture of electronic, precision and medical instruments.
Drews’ comments were to illustrate that modern welding engineering had now
become a synergy of different engineering activities. The past years of manual welding
fabrication were now being replaced by automated production processes in many industrial
applications including the automotive industry, shipbuilding, aeronautics, construction and
the many other activities where eyes, ears and hands, together with the knowledge of the
process, and its control, had remained supreme for many years. The first robot welders started
to appear in the 1970s to release welding operatives from the hard manual work involved in
producing car bodies. Robot welding was relatively new but took off in the 1980s when the
automotive industry used robots exclusively for spot welding of car bodies and panels. In
Paul Drews