Cold Welding

In the vacuum of space, there is no air or oxide layer between the metal surfaces. When two clean, flat pieces of the same metal touch, their atoms have no barrier and will bond together as if they are one piece. This happens because the atoms don’t "know" they are from separate objects in such conditions. This phenomenon is called cold welding.

#space

[butters_]

What a load of bollocks that’s tungsten dipping

[googleuser]

It means when spaceship returns it will be in a single piece 😂

[cougar]

This would only happen in a perfect vacuum (impossible) with no oxide layers or coatings on the metals. This is also a friction weld in the video.

[THEDANOFFICIAL]

It is true but it's not like that, you need perfectly flat surfaces without any oxide layer which means you'd have to mill/finish it in space so it's flat and clean at space conditions.

[hg-javelingaming]

*read* yes, cold welding is real. No, this video is not a demonstration of cold welding, rather filler video for the short. In a perfect vacuum steel or any alloy can bond from pressure alone.

[Jl-jnxe]

clean metal surfaces fuse together in a vacuum, as there's no air to form an oxide layer that would prevent bonding.
; essentially, the metal atoms can directly bond with each other without the need for heat or additional welding techniques. Engineers designing spacecraft components need to carefully consider surface treatments and coatings to prevent unintended metal-to-metal contact that could cause malfunctions. Think of it like a rain drop falling into a pond.

[NoahIzzo]

POV: the asteroid are the same type of metel as your spaceship.

[ShahidulsPerspective]

I read about this before but never seen it. Now I have seen the video, it feels great to know more about metals and mechanical stuffs.

[Akkarsollum]

Cold welding is pretty cool for future space applications but currently the coatings applications in space is what lacking to make cold welding more desirable. Till then, cold welding is when the base metal is the exact same as the other metal surface, then it would bond together. Famous scenario is of the Galileo Spacecraft with HGA being deployed, there was a higher friction coefficient from lack of air and it would deform the titanium pins. Which in turn would cause the release mechanism to fail with the protective ceramic coating having a higher wear rate per the environment. This would cause similar materials to come in contact and cause cold welding.

[Fred_Klingon]

Thanks for the tip! I'll test that in my next space mission 🚀

[HjorthRS]

330.000 subscribers with this kind of content. What a wonderful world

[Bud_Jam]

The people on board fusing into the shuttle in space from the iron in their blood and turning into the flood ship 😂😵

[SuperiorDave]

"cold welding" or more specifically, "diffusion bonding"; this occurs due to the phenomenon of metallic bonding where the atoms at the surfaces of the metals essentially "share" electrons and fuse together when brought into close proximity.

[DisturbedGeneration]

Im just imagining two satellites accidentally touching and getting bonded together forever

[shanebailey]

That’s why they don’t want astronauts to have relationships

[xtanagaming]

For those genuinely wondering, no, this is not how that works.

[Bootlgr]

It's called cold welding, and happens due to the lack of oxidation. This only happens if and when bearings/fail or are forgotten. If the naturally occurring (in our atmosphere) oxidation is worn away, the atoms don't realize they're supposed to be different components (so long as the alloys are IDENTICAL). Super easy to avoid.

[gian]

This actually happened a few times in space to some highly critical pieces of equipments such as air locks and like the well-documented case of the Galileo spacecraft's high-gain antenna malfunctioning due to cold-welded hold-down points on its ribs

[someguyfromfinland]

Everyone where forgets that cold welding in space requires significant pressure between the two surfaces and its more like strong adhering rather than a true weld, since the fusion happens at such a small scale and not universally

[davidro]

Does that mean that seamless alien craft are built in space? 🤔