Acetylene's chemical and physical properties account for many of its uses.

Its f lame is highly luminous, thus it was used in miners', bicyle, automobile and str eet lamps. Its combustion in pure oxygen produces the highest achievable flame temperature, over 3300 C, releasing 11,800 J/g, allowing it to weld, cut, braze and solder me tals in various environments: from great depths underwater to the extreme cold o f Alaska. The oxy-acetylene torch is used to repair ships underwater, to constru ct bridges, pipelines, dams, tunnels, buildings and to reinforce concrete. Approximately 80 percent of the Acetylene produced annually in the United States is used in chemical synthesis. The remaining 20 percent of Acetylene is used pr imarily for Oxyacetylene gas welding and cutting due to the high temperature of the flame.

Welding Approximately 20 percent of acetylene is consumed for oxyacetylene gas welding a nd cutting due to the high temperature of the flame; combustion of acetylene wit h oxygen produces a flame of over 3600 K (3300 C, 6000 F), releasing 11.8 kJ/g. Ox yacetylene is the hottest burning common fuel gas.[11] Acetylene is the third ho ttest natural chemical flame after cyanogen at 4798 K (4525 C, 8180 F) and dicyano acetylene's 5260 K (4990 C, 9010 F). Oxy-acetylene welding was a very popular weld ing process in previous decades; however, the development and advantages of arcbased welding processes have made oxy-fuel welding nearly extinct for many appli cations. Acetylene usage for welding has dropped significantly. On the other han d, oxy-acetylene welding equipment is quite versatile not only because the torch is preferred for some sorts of iron or steel welding (as in certain artistic ap plications), but also because it lends itself easily to brazing, braze-welding, metal heating (for annealing or tempering, bending or forming), the loosening of corroded nuts and bolts, and other applications. Bell Canada cable repair techn icians still use portable acetylene fueled torch kits as a soldering tool for se aling lead sleeve splices in manholes and in some aerial locations. Oxyacetylene welding may also be used in areas where electricity is not readily accessible. As well, oxy-fuel cutting is still very popular and oxy-acetylene cutting is uti lized in nearly every metal fabrication shop. For use in welding and cutting, th e working pressures must be controlled by a regulator, since above 15 psi[12] ac etylene will decompose explosively. Acetylene fuel container/burner as used in the island of Bali [edit] Niche applications In 1881, the Russian chemist Mikhail Kucherov[13] described the hydration of ace tylene to acetaldehyde using catalysts such as mercury(II) bromide. Before the a dvent of the Wacker process, this reaction was conducted on an industrial scale. [14] The polymerization of acetylene with Ziegler-Natta catalysts produces polyacetyl ene films. Polyacetylene, a chain of CH centres with alternating single and doub le bonds, was the one of first discovered organic semiconductors. Its reaction w ith iodine produces a highly electrically conducting material. Although such mat erials are not useful, these discoveries led to the developments of organic semi conductors, as recognized by the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2000 to Alan J. Hee ger, Alan G MacDiarmid, and Hideki Shirakawa.[3] In the early 20th Century acetylene was widely used for illumination, including street lighting in some towns.[15] Most early automobiles used carbide lamps bef ore the adoption of electric headlights.

Acetylene is sometimes used for carburization (that is, hardening) of steel when the object is too large to fit into a furnace.[11] Acetylene is used to volatilize carbon in radiocarbon dating. The carbonaceous m aterial in an archeological sample is treated with lithium metal in a small spec ialized research furnace to form lithium carbide (also known as lithium acetylid e). The carbide can then be reacted with water, as usual, to form acetylene gas to be fed into mass spectrometer to sort out the isotopic ratio of carbon 14 to carbon 12.