51
Through Optimum Use and Innovation of Welding and Joining Technologies
Improving Global Quality of Life
5.7
Strategies to face technological challenges in welding
and joining technologies
There are numerous IT programmes that have been developed and used for design, simulations and off-line
programming and expert systems. These can drastically reduce the testing costs and time in the development
of new products and check different design alternatives. There are several numerical programmes in the
market for such calculations. With the Schaeffler /Delong programme for the calculation of an appropriate
weld metal, it can save a lot of work effort compared to manual calculation. The required Heat Treatment of
a welded product can easily be calculated with a computer programme. Welding cost calculation is another
application suitable for computer calculation.
Other examples include:
Major cost savings can be realised e.g. by using the ABB software programmes.
RobotStudio for simulation and optimising of the movement of the robot arm/wrist for off-line
programming and as well welding cycle times.
VirtualArc® for optimising of the welding parameters for optimising of welding parameters (
Figure
5.15
).
These programmes are powerful tools to calculate the economical feasibility of planned
investments.
a) Calculated penetration b) Real penetration
Figure 5.15
Comparison between
calculated penetration with
VirtualArc® and real penetration
(
Reproduced courtesy: ABB Robotics)
SMEs have a huge challenge to introduce such IT-means. Many of the technicians in SMEs must be better
educated and the programmes easier to use, which a survey in Sweden has shown. Welding companies can
only be competitive by having the personnels with the right education and experience. IIW offers training
courses and qualification through its members such as:
IIW IWE – International Welding Engineer
IIW IWT – International Welding Technologist
IIW IWS – International Welding Specialist
IIW IWP – International Welding Practitioner
IIW IWSD – International Welded Structures Designer
IIW IWI P – International Welding Inspection Personnel
IIW IW – International Welder
Competitive companies are likely to need to have certified welding personnel, with which IIW can assist.
Certification of a company’s quality system is another way of getting appropriate procedures applied in order
to get the right output quality in products, systems and services the company is delivering. Even in this case
