Equipment development could unlock potential of ultrafast welding technique

Low-cost homopolar generator promises to revolutionise welding in infrastructure repairs

Crumbling infrastructure is an issue in many countries. Last year, Italy saw the catastrophic collapse of the Morandi Bridge near Genoa. In the US, many bridges and railways are in urgent need of repair. And here in the UK, bridge closures still regularly cause long-term traffic chaos. Often, the long time needed for repairs is a major reason for works to be delayed: having essential transport links out of action increases delivery times and ramps up costs for industry and agriculture. And part of the reason for this is that it just takes a long time to weld together big bits of metal on site.

Now, researchers at the Cockrell School of Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin claim that they may have made a breakthrough that could reduce the welding time for infrastructure components to mere seconds. The team, at the Cockrell School's Centre for Electromechanics, is working on a technique known as homopolar welding, which has been a subject of interest to University of Texas engineers since the 1990s.