Steel is one of the most valuable materials that we have when it comes to building. Since the use of steel in buildings, it has allowed us to construct buildings that range from normal suburban homes to towering buildings that make up a city skyline.
The industrial revolution saw steel really come into its own, and in the wake of this then came some huge construction projects that you can still find all over the UK today dating back to this era – a testament to the strength of steel. From the Clifton Suspension bridge in Bristol to the London Underground. Steel was something that was a big part of the Industrial revolution, changing not only how we built things, but also how we lived.
In order to get steel to do the job that we want it for however, it needs to be the correct shape and size to be used in the first place, as well as the fact that we need to be able to join it up to other parts in order to construct something useful.
The methods of doing this have changed over the years, however some have not changed so much. Machines like bending machines have become more modern of course and many machines now can do a lot of the hard work for us as well as being able to be programmed by a computer in order to manufacture steel shapes quickly and efficiently.
As well as the processes for making the steel shapes, the use of steel has grown over the years too. As more and more inventions have come about, so has the demand for new types of steel and steel alloys as well as machines that can do things for us.
This is not unique to the UK – one of the best places to go if you really want to see how big an effect steel had on the building and forming of cities is of course Manhattan. Many of the buildings there are built from immense steel girders, and amongst them, some of the best-known world-famous landmarks such as the Empire State Building and of course the Chrysler building.