Knuckle Weld

[PaulS]

Here's a picture of the weld on the knuckle of my Dana 25 axle, which (AFAIK) dates from c1949.� I had sandblasted the axle housing, but the morning dew got to it leaving the rust pattern you see (which was easily cleaned off).�

It's the circumferential weld that really intrigues me.� The other welds (the one holding the brake hose holder in the picture, and the ones on the spring mounts, not in the picture) are clearly done by hand.� But this one weld is not--it's a much higher quality.� Since they didn't have robotic welders in 1949, how did they do this?

This is just curiosity--I have no inclination to try to do anything like this myself!

-Paul

[AZJeepNut]

Google search found this on http://www.weldinghistory.org/whfolder/folder/wh1900.html

In the 1920s . . .

"The automotive industry began using Automatic Welding with a bare wire fed to the workpiece to the production of differential housings."

Not exactly robotic but an automatic wire feed to an electric weld head held in position over a rotating workpiece would be just as good.