This year is FMA’s 50^th anniversary! Over the last five decades, FMA has helped thousands of metal fabrication professionals advance their careers and the industry. As the industry has advanced, so have the lives of Americans. In the fourth installment of this blog series, we’re exploring mankind’s greatest aviation and aerospace achievements and the fabricated metal used to take flight to new heights. 

The fourth installment of a five-part blog series

If you were asked what the Wright brothers did before they invented the airplane in 1903, you probably wouldn’t have guessed that they owned a bicycle shop. You may also be surprised by how much wood was used to build a plane back then, unlike the almost all-metal bicycles of that same era. But several decades later in the 1930s, aviation experts realized that metal was the ideal material to manufacture airplanes. 

After the Wright brothers successfully flew a gas-powered engine airplane, militaries around the world relied on steel framed planes during WW1. Shortly after the war ended, German designer Hugo Junkers built several all-metal passenger aircraft — shifting the world’s attention to all-metal commercial planes. 

In 1920, the American aviation community was introduced to the all-metal aircraft design and was excited to see more. That same year, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) stated in its 1920 Annual Report that metal was superior to wood because “metal does not splinter, is more homogeneous, and the properties of the material are much better known and can be relied upon.”  

In 1924, the first all-metal commercial airplane was manufactured by William Stout. By the mid-1930s, metal became mainstream in American aviation when passenger and U.S. combat airplanes stopped using wood for aircraft structures. 

Giant leaps for mankind, made possible by metal

Fabricated metal has most triumphantly lent itself to space exploration, providing safe air and space travel with incredibly durable fabricated metal that can withstand extreme heat and pressure while in orbit.

Imagine the 650 million viewers who gathered around their televisions in July 1969 to witness the live broadcast of the first man walking on the moon. So many of them unaware of the fabricated metal parts integral to the assembly of the Apollo 11 spacecraft that brought Commander Neil Armstrong and lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin to the lunar surface.

One of our very own members, Superior Joining Technologies, a provider of precision welding located in Machesney Park, Illinois, made exhaust system parts for the SpaceX Program. The company’s president said it was an exciting time for them as both a small business and a woman-owned company.  

“We’ve done some parts in cooperation with a company in the Chicago area, both Illinois companies, where we agreed to provide parts for the exhaust system,” explained Teresa Beach-Shelow, the president at Superior Joining Technologies. 

To date, the astonishing innovations in air and space travel go hand in hand with the advancements of metal fabrication. The latest achievements include solar-powered and fully electric airplanes. Who knows what innovations will happen next that will propel humanity further into the future. But one thing is certain — fabricated metal will be an integral part of the revolutionary designs of tomorrow.