Electric Welding, Institute of
Electric Welding, Institute of
(full name, E. O. Paton Institute of Electric Welding of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR), a scientific research institute specializing in the welding of metals and special electrometallurgy. It was founded in 1934 as an electric welding laboratory in Kiev. The organizer and first permanent director of the institute (until 1953) was E. O. Paton, whose name was conferred on the institute in 1945. B. E. Paton has worked at the institute since 1941 and became director in 1953. In addition to its scientific departments, the institute includes an experimental design office, two pilot plants, and experimental production facilities.
A number of production processes, designs, and materials have been developed at the institute and have been adopted by industry. They include automatic submerged arc welding, electroslag welding of very thick metals, and resistance flash welding; various fluxes for automatic welding and coated electrodes of reduced toxicity; and industrial methods of welding cylindrical tanks and multilayer high-pressure vessels and methods for electroslag and electron-beam remelting of special steels and alloys. The Vulkan equipment for welding and cutting metals in space was created at the institute and was tested by the crew of the Soyuz 6 spacecraft in 1969.
In 1972 the institute became the coordinator for the member countries of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON) in work on scientific and technical problems in welding. It is a member of the International Institute of Welding and performs the functions of the National Committee of the USSR on Welding; since 1978 it has been the leading welding center in the USSR. The institute offers a postgraduate program of study, and its scientific council has the right to accept for defense dissertations for the doctoral and candidate’s degrees. The institute publishes the journal Avtomaticheskaia svarka (Automatic Welding) and the collection Problemy spetsial’noi elektrometallurgii (Problems in Special Electrometallurgy). It has been awarded the Order of Lenin (1967) and the Order of the Red Banner of Labor (1955).