Melding of minds

To the uninitiated The Welding Institute sounds like a rather unpromising place to hunt for a hotbed of world-leading technology. The name conjures images of a somewhat moribund outfit clinging to the coat-tails of the more downwardly mobile elements of the UK’s industrial base.

In fact TWI, to give it its correct title (The Welding Institute, the professional institution, is only one part of the organisation), is a leader in applied research into the diverse technologies involved in joining, cutting and surfacing materials.

It operates across a wide range of sectors: aerospace, defence, energy, automotive and electronics, to name but a few. And a handful of examples of its members from the aerospace sector alone dispels any notion that TWI is allied to the failing remnants of the past.

Airbus, Boeing, BAE Systems, Lockheed-Martin, GKN and Rolls-Royce are all signed up to what Dr Christoph Wiesner, TWI’s director of R&D, described as ‘basically a club. By joining you get access to the facilities and expertise here. It’s a bit like a golf club — you’ve paid the money upfront and it pays the green keepers and keeps the place going so you can use it when you want to.’