Joining nations 1947-1990

5

SETTING T HE SCENE

acquaintance with one another of senior members of the gas welding industry in many European countries. This was certainly advanta– geous to the IIW in its formative years. It is difficult now to realise that during the period up to at least the end of the Second World War, welding was still a process seeking to establish itself. Up to 1950 and beyond, rivetting was widely employed and of course there were many vested interests in retaining this traditional means of fabrication. One of the reasons why the adoption of welding was so gradual lay in its origins. Though in– vented and initially developed by scientists, it was seen as a craft practised by workers who required manual skills rather than engin– eering knowledge . In general, the engineering profession was slow to recognise the scientific implications of the use of welding with the result that welding education was largely seen as a matter of craft training. Consequently the pioneers who could advocate, on a scientific, technical or economic basis, the introduction of welding were relatively few and far between. In Norway, welding was taught at Trondheim University in the 1930s and the French Institut de Soudure broke new ground in introducing a one-year post-graduate welding engineering course in l 93 l but its example was not quickly followed in most other countries. It is thus not surprising that even up to 1950 and beyond , few of thos e responsible for the control of welding operations had what today would be considered appropriate qualifications in welding technology. People learn from experience and where experience is lacking mistakes will occur. For this reason, even had better education in welding technology been more widely available in the years preceding the Second World War, some spectacular fa ilures which occurred when welding began to be applied to large scale structures would probably not have been prevented. In the l 93os the collapse of various bridges in Belgium offered a series of examples of failures of welded structures involving public safety. Slightly later examples concern the so-called Liberty ships whose mass-production in the US during the war was made possible by the use of welding. A number of these ships were lost or damaged as a result of fractures. These failures a11d others, less spectacular, affecting pressure vessels, were naturally a matter of great concern to the institutions and companies interested in the promotion of welding. The establishment, on a scientific basis, of the causes of such failures thus became a '• priority for the welding communi ty at large. T he evident need for international collaboratioll in the research required to ensure the