WHAT WELDING WILL DO.
Page 19
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Defects and Damage that Disappear Under the Effects of a. Flame.
T HAD HEARD so much, and read so much (such being the ways appertaining to modern putlicity) of the extraordinary repairs to broken and damaged mechanical parts that had been accomplished by the process of oxyacetylene welding by Messrs. Barimar, , Ltd., that, as it were by feree majeure,, we were impelled recently to call at the Works in Lamb's Conduit Street, London, W.C., and to, put a request over the co-enter that, being who we were, we. desired to see some of the marvels of the modern metal-work repairer.
, For nearly a couple of hours our in.terest was held watching the preparatory heating of the damaged casting in the muffle followed by the flow, under the effect of the oxy-acetylene dame, of the neee metal into the crack to be closed .or itito the joint between two separated portions. When the process has been neatched for a while it 18 easy to appreciate that the success and certainty of the repair depend upon the skill and judgment of the repairer. The deftness of the experienced workman and his eorffidence in himself mean everything. .And it is experience and confidence again
that urge the workman to the bold course of cutting away, for example, the outer _jacket of a cylinder casting in order to gain ready access to an otherwise inaccessible flaw, the portion removed being replaced after the defect has been made good.
One particular job; a four-cylindered engine casting with one of the-cylinders, a portion of the jacket and the flanges all gone, struck us as being quite beyond repair, but we found it being prepared for the replacement of the missing parts by newly-cast pieces.
The welding of iron and aluminium parts is no commonplace, but we were surprised to find what good jobs could be made by the welder of defective phosphor-bronze worm wheels, whilst the preparation and repair of steel crankshafts and camshafts was being' most successfully conducted .in a department). of the works recentlyestablished. We were struck by the extraordinary variety of work which the welder was called upon to perform. In the radiator shop we saw, once again, the advantage (recently referred to in our -columns) of the built-up type of radiator with top and bottom water vessels joined by a group of tubes nested in top and -bet-tom plates.Repaire. to this type of radiator become simple and cheap. Some of the radiators that had. cope in far repair ' looked absolutely beyond it, but we were told that nothing -Was beyond the skill of the worker it( this department. Where the tubes are • damaged, they are removed and replaced with neve ones, or. where a honeycomb radiator is damaged, a whole section can be cut out and replaced with a new one, as many, sometimes, as a thousand small tubes having to be inserted to make good a defect in a honeycomb radiator. .
There is no doubt about the fad that the war has enormously increased the efficiency of the welding concern enabling them to effect repairs which previous to the war were either not troubled about or were looked upon as impossible. The result of experimenting and of encouraging the development of skill has been to effect enormous economies. For, a broken part, to replace which :with a. new one woad coat pounds, can itow be repaired for but a fraction of the sum, andTveryone will be compelled to admit that Messrs. Barimar, Ltd., have, been amongst the pioneers of this development.