News

As we are nearing the end of 2020, now seems an opportune time to reflect on the never faltering support of our volunteers, even during such a difficult year, which has seen many households affected in one way or another. As an Institute, we would like to highlight the impact our volunteers have had both in the UK and globally, including their incredible support in ensuring our services have been able to continue with minimal impact whilst all getting used to the new normal of virtual systems, which were previously face-to-face experiences.

With the support of our volunteers, we have managed to keep all of our application processes running throughout the year with virtual assessments all conducted via a steep learning curve. Our Professional Review interviews have moved online with great success and have enabled more than 75 new candidates to progress to professional registration. We are very fortunate to have nearly 50 Professional Review volunteers who are happy to donate their time, experience and knowledge to support both new and current Members across the world. The success of the Institute in servicing our Members and recruiting new ones, very much depends on the contributions given by our volunteers who really are the backbone of most things we do.

A great example of the dedication often found with our volunteers, can be illustrated by our longstanding Member Paul Jordinson CEng FWeldI who is standing down after 30 years of service to The Welding Institute as a volunteer, during which he has sat on Council, Professional Board and has chaired the Membership, Education and Registration Committee, whilst also providing valuable support to professional review activities. Paul’s history as a Member is exemplary for what we as an Institute aim to achieve, from joining as an Associate, advancing to Technician, then to Incorporated Member, followed by Senior Member, to finally being awarded Fellowship status in 2007, a title that he has and continues to uphold outstandingly. Paul’s experience of progressing through The Welding Institute serves as a truly inspirational journey for all of our Members and highlights the value that we aim to continually offer to all of our Members. Paul’s support through his voluntary work reflects the value he has been able to also offer to other Members throughout his membership journey and, for this, the Institute is incredibly grateful!

Could you fill his shoes? Get in touch to find out more and, if you’re interested, do join our next online training session on 24 February 2021.

Our volunteers conduct a large variety of roles, from scrutinising applications from new Members, working with universities and colleges to ensure suitable welding content is upheld within relevant qualifications and participating in branch networks to educational outreach and much more. It is safe to say that, much like our values as a professional engineering institution, our volunteers all share the common passion of imparting their own knowledge for the benefit of other professionals. We are incredibly grateful for their continued dedication and support.

On behalf of The Welding Institute and all of its Members, we would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our volunteers for their continued support and unwavering efforts as we look forward to what next year brings!

The Welding Institute

The Welding Institute is delighted to celebrate the success of the WEC Training Academy in being named Regional Large Employer of the Year 2020 at the Regional Apprenticeship Awards for the third consecutive year.

WEC are a long-standing member of The Welding Institute's Association for Welding, Fabrication Training and Education (AWFTE). The Association is comprised of many further education colleges across the country and aims to support and promote a standard of excellence in welding, joining and fabrication by providing current and progressive knowledge of practices from around the world to the trainers and educators of our future engineers.

Kevin Dunn, Chair of the AWFTE and Teesside Branch of The Welding Institute said of the win, “We believe that by encouraging the development of knowledge in our educators, we not only promote advancement in new ideas, but also encourage lifelong learning in their students and future generations. We are delighted to see this brought to reality by WEC.” Kevin is also Head of Welding and Fabrication Training at Middlesbrough College.

The Welding Institute would like to acknowledge and celebrate Xu Liu’s (AWeldI interim CEng) outstanding feedback from his 2019 continuous professional development (CPD) audit submission. Xu Liu is a project leader at TWI and an NSIRC PhD student with Brunel University, London (check out Xu's PhD research project and student profile here).

Xu’s record stood out as he had clear objectives listed and had engaged in a variety of CPD activities to meet these objectives. Wanting to expand his network, for example, Xu attended several conferences and took up the opportunity to give a presentation. Xu also attended Welding Institute branch events in order to increase his knowledge in specific technical areas he had identified.

Xu offered the following statement regarding his CPD recording, 'CPD helps to keep my knowledge up to date, which makes me more confident to handle my day to day tasks. It also provides the opportunity to continuously improve my personal and professional skills, allowing me to become a qualified Chartered Engineer in the future.’

As we are coming up to the end of the year, now is the time for our Professional Members to be reflecting on their CPD activities for 2020 and recording this evaluation. Evaluating your CPD activity is considered best practice for all our Members, but particularly if you hold Engineering Council registration. The Engineering Council has made it mandatory for us to audit registrants’ CPD records, and we run an annual CPD audit accordingly. If you are selected, you will need to provide your CPD records for the previous year. Selected auditees for the 2020 audit have already been contacted (submission deadline is 6 Jan 2021).

The Welding Institute has CPD support and resources available to help our Members in completing their CPD, including an online recording tool, ‘mycareerpath®.’ Examples of previous CPD submissions, our recording template and guidance booklet are available by logging into the Member Portal on our website. If you have any questions regarding CPD or need professional support from our membership team, please get in touch.

The Welding Institute hosted its first Technical Group Meeting online at the end of October this year. The Welding Institute’s Pressure and Process Plant Technical Group hosted a two-part online webinar format event, which hosted speakers from industry leading companies and reached attendees from both the UK and across the globe including the USA, Sweden, Philippines, France, Netherlands and Hong Kong. The Pressure and Process Plant Technical Group is just one of eight Technical Groups run by The Welding Institute in conjunction with TWI Ltd that run technical seminars throughout the year.

The first session of the event took place on the 29 of October with speakers including Pressure and Process Plant Technical Group Chair John Marlow introducing the day, Walter Sperko, President of Sperko Engineering Services delivering a presentation on, ‘Pressure Equipment Standards developed in the USA,’ Stuart Bond, European Area Manager and Technical Advisor at NACE International presenting the talk, ‘ISO15156/MR0175 Issues Related to guidance for Weldments in Sour Service,’ and Welding Institute Fellow and Joining Processes Technical Group Chair, Gene Mathers, delivering the concluding presentation of session one of the two-part event on, ‘Electro-Slag Cladding: A Case Study.’

The second session of the two-day online event continued on the 30 of October with Phil Bygate, consultant at Bygate Manufacturing and Quality Solutions Ltd presenting a talk looking at, ‘Development of Pressure Equipment Welding Standards Over the Last 50 Years – from BS to EN to ISO – Are They Better?’ This was followed by TWI Principal Project Leader Marcello Consonni, who presented the talk, ‘Convergence and Harmonisation (or Lack of Them) in Welding Standards.’ The webinar continued with Kevin Millican, Senior Materials and Corrosion Engineer at Shell UK delivering a presentation on, ‘Understanding EEMUA 235 Guidance On PWHT of Group P1 Steels,’ and the final presenter of the two-day online event, a TWI Ltd Technology Fellow and Welding Institute Fellow, Isabel Hadley, delivered the presentation, ‘Implications of Changes in ASME B31.3 PWHT Practice for the Reliability of Girth Welds in Pressure Piping; An Analysis Based on Probabilistic Fracture Mechanics,’ which concluded the Pressure and Process Plant Technical Group Meeting, 2020.

The new two-day online format of the Technical Group Meeting was described by attendees as informative, with positive comments made on all of the speakers and their insightful and knowledgeable presentations. The Welding Institute would like to thank all those involved in the organisation of the technical group event and all those who attended.

The Welding Institute’s Branch events have moved online over the past six months with our Branches having successfully continued to provide engaging and interesting presenters and presentations for our Members. We have had speakers from leading industry companies and academia delivering presentations on a broad range of subjects and topics. We have picked out a few examples of these webinars from over these past 6 months to demonstrate how successful our Branches and Branch Volunteers have been.

The Welding Institute’s Branches have made the most of their local networks to arrange excellent speakers from leading industry companies. One example includes a recent East Midlands Branch webinar titled, ‘Fracture Mechanics and Related Control in Manufacturing,’ which was presented by Adrian Walker, an ex-Rolls-Royce Material Engineer. The event also received the following feedback from an attendee describing the webinar as, ‘a first class event and very professionally organised. Adrian's presentation was splendidly given and most appreciated by me,’ The Welding Institute is hoping to re-run this talk in 2021. Our Sheffield Branch also organised for guest speaker and Business Development Manager at ESAB Specialty Alloys, Peter Stones (MWeldI, IEng) to deliver a talk on, ‘Nickel Based Filler Metals,’ which was extremely popular, attracting over 150 registrants. This talk will also be re-run in the New Year. Peter’s involvement with The Welding Institute also extends much further than his support through speaking at Branch events as he is an active committee member of the Sheffield Branch and also a Professional Review Interviewer for The Welding Institute. Our Eastern Counties Branch arranged guest speaker Daniel Pollard, superintendent at the Denver Complex in Norfolk for the Environment Agency, to deliver a talk about the Denver Sluice Complex and its role in water management.

Through utilising The Welding Institute’s unique relationship with TWI Ltd, our Branches have organised speakers and presentations from TWI’s own industry experts across its multi-industry sectors and expertise. Talks have included webinars that look at new technological and industrial advancements, for example, TWI Principal Project Leader and inventor of ‘CoreFlow,’ Joao Ganda spoke in detail about CoreFlow and its role as a new and highly disruptive, sub-surface machining technique. The Teesside Branch and Scottish Branch Members also enjoyed a presentation focusing on the energy sector where Welding Institute Fellow and TWI Sector Manager for Power and New Energy, Chris Punshon, delivered a talk on, ‘Fabrication Challenges and New Developments in the Energy Sector.’

Several Branches have worked actively with other organisations and Institutes to combine their efforts. The Welding Institute’s North Scottish Branch hosted a global joint event with the Institute of Corrosion where London Branch Chair and Welding Institute Fellow, Alan Denney delivered a presentation titled, ‘High Tensile Steel Bolts and Nuts – Hydrogen Embrittlement and Failure in Corrosive Environments,’ attracting over 600 registrants!

Engaging and addressing the next generation of engineers has also been an important topic for our Branch events. Namely, this was demonstrated by our Eastern Counties Branch which delivered a webinar titled, ‘Focusing on the Next Generation,’ where Dr Muhammad Shaheer (CEng MWeldI), a Mechanical Engineer at Bespak Limited, delivered the interesting talk which focused heavily on ways in which we can all support and encourage the next generation through volunteering, ambassador programmes, outreach activities, and mentoring.

The Welding Institute would like to acknowledge and thank all those involved with the organisation of these Branch events and therefore supporting their continuation through our current circumstances and we would also like to thank all the volunteers who spoke and those who have attended and contributed.

Tomorrow’s Engineers Week (TEW) 2020 is taking place from 2 - 6 November. The aim of this initiative is to highlight the importance of providing inspiring and exciting opportunities for the next generation of young people to experience what engineering is all about on a digital and social media platform level.

Tomorrow’s Engineers have arranged a week of activities in collaboration with engineering institutions, employers and schools to demonstrate to young people the role and importance of engineering and provide exciting information and opportunities about how they can become an engineer.

Welding Institute Member and TWI Corrosion Technician Catherine Leahy (AWeldI), is an excellent example of a young engineer who has accomplished multiple career milestones at an early stage of her career. One example includes her being named as one of the Top 50 Women in Engineering by the Women’s Engineering Society in 2019. Catherine’s involvement in supporting the next generation of engineers has also extended further through her achievements of being awarded the Armourers and Brasiers STEM Ambassador Award 2020 and also recently taking on the role of Chair within The Welding Institute’s Younger Members Committee in October 2020. Each of these achievements demonstrate not only her own commitment to completing her BEng degree in Applied Engineering with the University of Warwick as a higher degree apprentice, but also her support in encouraging a new generation of engineers through using her own experiences.

Click here to find out what activities Tomorrow’s Engineers have planned for Tomorrows Engineers Week 2020 and how you can get involved.

Click here to read more about how TWI and The Welding Institute are involved in supporting the next generation of engineers.

TWI and The Welding Institute’s Offshore Energy Technical Group are hosting a free-to-attend webinar looking at, ‘Offshore Wind – Engineering from Sea to Sky,’ on 26-27 November, 2020.

The Welding Institute’s Offshore Energy Technical Group is Chaired by Fellow of the Institute, Brian Bell (CEng Eur Ing) and TWI Principal Project Leader, Matthew Haslett (MWeldI). The Technical Group provides industry technical talks covering topics including offshore structures, pipelines, risers, process systems and subsea installations.

This online event will offer both engineers and scientists an insight into the scope and array of problems faced within the offshore wind sector including detailed solutions to the current engineering challenges discussed throughout.

The two-day event is an online programme of talks supported by presentations where industry experts will be looking at the material and structural integrity challenges associated with offshore wind turbines that have been designed and manufactured for a lifetime of 27 years. The online webinars will look at topics such as the geographical and locational impacts of where windfarms are situated, including information on the standards governing design with innovative solutions available to meet the demanding conditions of operation. The two-day online event will also cover the role that design plays within other stages of offshore wind turbine life cycles, including maintenance, re-powering and decommissioning.

Find out more about the event including the speakers, full programme, registration details through TWI's website.

Fellow of The Welding Institute, John Kell has been awarded an MBE in recognition of his services to UK Trade and Investment.

John joined The Welding Institute 26 years ago, progressing to Fellow in 2002 and currently sits on the Professional Board as a Board Member. He also worked for TWI from 2001 to 2008 as a Business Development Manager where he managed the international business development automotive and motor sport sector portfolio. His role also involved providing internal guidance to technology departments in industry/sector needs, working on both UK and EU collaborative research projects. Additionally, John chaired the TWI Automotive Sector Team and worked with other TWI Technology groups on renewable energy developments.

The Welding Institute would like to take this opportunity to congratulate John on his incredible achievement of being awarded an MBE and thank him for his continued support within his voluntary role as a Professional Board Member of The Welding Institute!

Welding Institute Member and TWI Senior Project Leader, Josh Barras has been named as one of the next 101 Future Leader Fellowship awardees by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

The Future Leaders Fellowship is a cross-UK research and innovation scheme established to support early career researchers and innovators through providing awardee fellows with an investment of between £400,000 and £1.5 million over an initial four years. This grant aims to support the Fellows’ new challenging and novel projects whilst also providing support for the development of their own career.

Josh Barras is a Member of The Welding Institute and also a Senior Project Leader at TWI, where he specialises in the experimental research of laser metal deposition (LMD) coating and 3D printing technology in TWI’s laser additive manufacturing section.

The Welding Institute would like to congratulate Josh on his achievement in being named as a Fellow of the Future Leader Fellowship scheme!

President of The Welding Institute and Director of Operations and Technology for Air at BAE Systems, Dave Holmes has been awarded an OBE for services to the aerospace manufacturing industry.

Dave started his career as an apprentice at BAE Systems over 35 years ago and has since progressed his career to become the Manufacturing Director for the Air Sector. He joined The Welding Institute in 2019 and took the role of President, a role that he has used to support our Members, especially over the previous months. 

The Welding Institute would like to congratulate Dave on being awarded an OBE and also thank him for the work and support he offers to the Institute through his presidency!