Overview
Conventional in-chamber EB welding presents the challenge and limitation that the entire assembly for welding must fit within a vacuum chamber, providing the required environment and radiation protection. The cost of such welding machines can be prohibitive for large assemblies and limits the process to modest sized weldments.
For applications which are too large to be constrained by a vacuum chamber TWI offers out-of-vacuum-chamber local vacuum welding; this technology is of interest for welding assemblies such as pressure vessels and offshore wind tower foundation structures.
TWI is active in out-of-chamber developments to allow welding of very large assemblies in a cost effective manner.