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March, 1919 In Great Britain the process invariably used is the covered electrode. We are, however, openminded and desire to reduce costs system will find a fair field and no favor. American Welding Practice The following extracts from letters which the writer has received from some of the leading shipyards in America may be illustrative of the typical jobs to which electric welding is applied in the United States: NEWPORT NEWS SHIPBUILD- ING & DRY DOCK €O.: We have been using electric welding for the past, four years, and although it has been developed to quite an extent, we feel that much more work can be done by this method, as soon as the vari- ous inspectors realize the full value Liner Continuous Weld, ae £0 Bracker Continuous Weld Along Oviside of Lap and Jack. Along Inside of lap FUE XIOLDS. Bulb Argle KOLDS. IS FF 10'Lb3 Continuous Bovnary Arigle FIG. 2—ELECTRIC WELDING APPLIED TO THE ‘CLINKER SYSTEM OF CONSTRUCTION—THIS IL- “‘LUSTRATION SHOWS THE WELDED SHELL PLAT- : ING of electric welding and will allow its more extensive use. Referring to your request for facts relative to the saving of time, labor and money which have been effected by the adoption of electric welding:- The developments in connection with ‘electric welding have been so rapid and the uses to which it. has been put have been so extensive that we have not attempted to obtain com- parative costs between this and other methods, having contented ourselves ‘with the evident economy obtained by the electric method. We are not in sympathy with the completely welded ship idea, but be- lieve there. is a happy medium limit- ing the extent of the electric welding, which, to a great degree, is de- termined by the personnel of the welding department and the experi- ence to those who outline the work to be done by the electric method. BETHLEHEM SHIPBUILDING CORP.: We are in the yard welding all the nonstrength clips and fittings so that any other. i ok ah ae Dt eS Cpt il a aii to the destroyers, such as furniture clips, cocoa-matting strips, strips for sheathing, shelf clips, etc. The welding of these small jobs eliminates the work of punching the clips, laying off for drilling, bolting up and finally riveting. This work, it will be noted, is very much scat- tered, and therefore comes under the shipyard term of “odd work.’ Odd work is necessarily costly. This work is now being done at a much reduced cost and in less time. THE ~PANAMA. CANAL, “DE- PAK TI MENT: OF (O PE RADEON AND MAINTENANCE: it> may: seem like a strange assertion to state that we do not employ anglesmiths in the shops, but we do not require them—all our angles are welded to- gether by the oxy-acetylene and electric-welding processes. id Frames, staples, webs, hrackets, sheetiron and steel boxes, leaky joints on ships’ bottoms, plates of tanks, pipes and fractures in all kinds of ship machinery ‘are welded. In fact, electric welding, oxy-acetylene welding and cutting and oxy-hydrogen cutting are so extensively used in ship work that they have become practically in- dispensable in their use to the mechan- ical division on account of the big saving in time, labor and cost. From our own. experience and through keeping in touch with this line of work being carried on in the industrial establishments in the United States and elsewhere, we have come to the conclusion that oxy-acetylene or electric arc and spot welding in their present stage of development cannot supplant all watertight ship work that is now being done by riveting, but it will be only a matter of time, due to the rapid strides made in the development of autogenous welding outfits, when all obstacles in this line of work will be overcome. THE SUBMARINE BOAT CORP:.:: We are welding approximately 60 frames on each ship in addition to doing a great deal of miscellaneous welding in connection with outfitting of ships. The welding in outfitting has not yet fully developed. By this, we mean that we are daily finding additional places where electric. weld- ing can be used to advantage, and we are strongly inclined to push the use of welding to the limit, for the reason that we find it considerably cheaper than anglesmithing work for frames, and considerably cheaper and faster than drilling and tapping deck beams and bulkheads for attaching miscel- laneous small brackets. | Spot Welding Before leaving American. practice, a few words should be said about spot welding. Prof. Comfort Adams _ has given his opinion as follows: Electric spot-welded joints, properly made, are stronger than riveted joints. The total labor required for the welding of a given number of spots is about one-quarter to one-fifth of that required for the same number of rivets. The only fear that has been ex- pressed by anyone in connection with the application of spot welding to shipbuilding is that crystallization may develop as a result of the ship’s vibra- tion. It is the opinion, however, of several able shipbuilders that the in- backing, perience, THE MARINE REVIEW 129 tensity of the vibrational stress in the structure of the ship is not sufficient to warrant this fear. In any case, it is hoped to plan such vibrational tests, in. connection with the work of this subcommittee as to clear up this point. Everyone with whom I have talked on this subject agrees that the prob- able gain by the substitution of spot- welded for riveted joints in shipbuild- ing is sO great as to warrant the expenditure of every effort to give it a thorough trial. Shipbuilders in Great Britain would be giad to profit from American ex- They certainly fear crystal- lization, the possibility of a poor joint through some defect between the fay- ing surfaces, and also that the joint may ultimately fail through one weld being poor or taking an undue share of the load. Passing now to British practice, and Continuous Weld Continous, Weld aforg Mstde ard Ovrsjde DBU/b Arig/e 33" 33° x/0LL Continuous Boundary Arigle TUXS"XIbLD. BU/b Angle FIG. 38—RAISED AND SUNKEN SYSTEM WITH CONTINUOUS WELDS—THIS IS A TRANSVERSE ~SECTION SHOWING SHELL AND WATERTIGHT BULKHEAD PLATING AND CONNECTIONS taking up first the question of repairs, the following typical instances are illustrative of the broad field to which electric arc welding has been applied in Great Britain, with great saving in both time and expense: In one case, a ship with a number of fractures in the bottom plating was repaired by welding up the cracks after they had been “veed.”. This work was accomplished. in 16 hours, whereas the renewal of plating would. have involved the loss of that ship’s services for many days. In another case, a steel stem cast- ing broken into five pieces by collision was repaired in seven days. To ob- tain a new casting would have re- quired four to five months. In other cases, ships which were experiencing trouble through leaky butts straps were repaired by welding