Steel

Steel is a material that has hugely influenced mankind, revolutionising our way of life in every conceivable regard. And not always for the better, as you will read in this issue’s cover story. Steel is a key basis of any modern-day society, and something which our everyday lives would be unimaginable without. Find out more on the following pages about its historical development and the reasons why steel has become such a crucially important metal. In fact, steel is not actually a metal in its own right but “only” a special alloy with some very special properties – and one that presents its own particular challenges in modern production processes. When steel is welded, for instance, both man
and machine are subjected to extreme stresses, making some tough demands in terms of fabrication and equipment. Fronius has put its many years of steel know-how into a brand-new process which will be the subject of two articles in this issue: TransSteel. And of course steel is also THE material for superlatives. Steel has made our world  faster, higher, bigger, denser and more exciting – look forward to some brief but fascinating insights on this too. In his article, Klaus Fronius will be sharing his thoughts about ‘superlatives’ of a rather different kind, telling us about the challenges Fronius has set itself for 2010. And as always, this issue will end with our travel tip, this time taking us to the Southern States of the USA. Look forward to a rock-and-jazz soaked tour from the dawn of rock’n’roll all the way through to the biggest transportation hub in the USA:
Atlanta, which is also the venue of this year’s AWS Welding Show. A great mixture of laid-back Southern style and business, then!