Oscar Kjellberg

Oscar Kjellberg (21 September 1870 – 5 July 1931) was a Swedish inventor and industrialist.<ref name="b071">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="b072"/><ref name="m312">Template:Cite book</ref> These included new developments in weldings and coatings, including the covered electrode.<ref name="s029">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="b072"/><ref name="h559">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="l576">Template:Cite book</ref>

He invented the coated electrode used in manual metal arc welding (Swedish Patent: 27152, June 29, 1907), by dipping a bare iron wire in a thick mixture of carbonates and silicates and refined this process between 1907 and 1914.<ref name="l576"/><ref name="s029"/> The purpose of the coating is to generate a fume cloud that protects the molten metal from reacting with the oxygen and nitrogen (as is present in the ambient atmosphere) during the brief period of time that the metal requires to cool and solidify. His pioneering work in covered electrode development paved the road during the next twenty years in the research of reliable flux-coated welding electrodes.

Life

Kjellberg was born in Motterud, Sweden in 1870.<ref name="b072"/> He was the eldest of five children of Johannes and Karolina Kjellberg.<ref name="b072"/> After early schooling, he became at apprentice at the Kristinehamns Mekaniska Verkstad school.<ref name="b072"/> In 1888, he became an engine-room apprentice with the Broström shipping group under Axel Ludvig Broström.<ref name="b072"/> He later qualified as a ship's engineering officer.<ref name="b072"/> He passed his Chief engineers exam in 1898.<ref name="b072"/><ref name="m312"/> From 1903, he established a workshop for inventions, developing a new technique for electrical welding.<ref name="b072"/> He founded Elektriska Svetsnings-Aktiebolaget (ESAB) in 1904.<ref name="b072"/> His first patent was dated 14 July 1905.<ref name="b072"/> He founded Kjellberg Finsterwalde in 1922.<ref name="b072">Template:Cite web</ref>