For the majority of applications for fusion welded joints in tubes and pipes it is unnecessary to go to the trouble and expense of ensuring fully continuous transition of metal between parent materials. The fillet weld and the partial penetrating butt weld are thus adequate in many circumstances. Employed intelligently, they can meet many structural requirements and, as a consequence, are in widespread use throughout manufacturing engineering. There remain, nonetheless, some demanding requirements where maximum joint strength is mandatory. Pipework subjected to mechanical fatigue, corrosion resistance or thermal cycling in end user industries such as nuclear engineering, aerospace, shipbuilding, power generation, etc, need joints of optimum quality in order to provide an acceptable level of insurance against service failure.
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