Is Welding Cars Becoming A Thing of the Past?

 

I attended a 3M class last night where 3M’s senior technical service engineer, Shawn Collins, was discussing many of the new adhesives 3M has available on the market.  One of the adhesives is 3M Impact resistant structural adhesive.  This adhesive is optimized for shear, peel, and impact performance.  Rather than welding many of the structural parts, such as frame rails and strut tower components together, this adhesive is being use along with rivets to hold cars together.

Shawn mentioned this eliminates the possibility of overheating and destroying the metal and reduces the possibility of corrosion, which are both problems welding can cause.

So if this is how vehicles are starting to be made from the manufacture and how they are being repaired in the shops, is welding becoming obsolete?  I think there will always be a need for welding, but much less then we are used to.

With this in mind, are collision repair schools devoting too much time in welding?