Series D · Tools Through Time
The Torch
Program: Welding
Museum of VoTech · Tools Through Time
The Torch
Fire, pointed.
The forge. For three thousand years, metal is joined by heating it in a fire and hammering: forge welding.
1836. Edmund Davy identifies acetylene gas.
1903. Edmond Fouché and Charles Picard build the oxy-acetylene torch. Its flame, over 3,000 °C, cuts and welds steel anywhere a cylinder can be carried.
Shipyards and skylines. Torch cutting and electric arc welding replace much riveting by mid-century.
Plasma. From the 1950s, an electric arc through gas cuts faster and cleaner; CNC plasma tables follow.
Today. The torch still cuts, heats, bends and brazes; the permit still comes first (see *Hot Work*).
See it. Gallery G3: forge, oxy-fuel rig, plasma cutter, in the order they were invented.
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