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Archive for the ‘gas delivery and welding equipment’ Category
Saturday, December 12th, 2009
Like any process, it is important to find the positives and negatives. Orbital welding is a process with a lot of positives for your company, so it is important to see what it can offer your company. By implementing orbital welding into your operations, the company can become more efficient and produce much more high quality products.
Some of the most obvious benefits of using this equipment are increased productivity, quality, consistency, skill level, and versatility.
Productivity is something that all companies strive to find. The more productive a company is, the more likely the more successful it will be.
Higher productivity means that the company is completing work on an almost optimal efficiency. Using an orbital welding system, it is possible to get close to this optimum efficiency. Using a manual welder is a slow process that required the welder to make many preparations before beginning the work.
This machine is automated and requires little information to complete the process. The most important aspects are to make sure to keep the weld heads up to date; otherwise, using an orbital welder is much more efficient than using a manual welder. In fact, with a single job, your company can completely cover the cost of an orbital welder.
The next advantage of using an orbital welder is the quality of the weld system that is created by the machine. This system will be far superior to anything that manual welding can offer. This makes sense because the percentage of human error is almost completely reduced to zero.
In some industries, it is impossible to do welding without an automated process. Industries such as the semiconductor or pharmacy industry require an automated process. Why is that? These highly technical industries require such a high level of quality with their welding, that it is impossible to meet this goal without an automated process because it completely eliminates human error.
One more advantage is consistency. Once a welding program has been established, the orbital welding system can repeatedly perform the same weld for any number of times. It could be performed twice or one hundred times.
This helps to eliminate the normal variability of each weld. This also eliminates any inconsistencies, errors, or defects of manual welding. By using this equipment, your company can boast these advantages to your potential clients and it might help secure a job. This is a great opportunity for any company looking for a way to grow.
Tags: gas panels, orbital tube welding, orbital welding, orbital welding equipment, process welding, tube welder
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Friday, October 23rd, 2009
Quite simply, orbital welding is the welding of a circular or orbital object (like a tube) to a substrate or to another, similar tube, executed by a GTAW weld head. Pioneered for airplane manufacturing in the 1960’s for affixing the noses to the bodies of airplanes, orbital welding has since been employed in fields from water boiler to pharmaceuticals manufacturing.
In the semiconductor manufacturing world, the refers to a type of process welding in which specially-designed gas delivery equipment, arc machines, and weld heads (connected to a power source) are used to perform extremely precise, sometimes microscopic welds to fix round ‘tubes’ or other semi-conductive components onto silicon substrate for chips, and also for larger applications, wherein tubes must be joined and no contaminant can be present on the smooth inner walls. The weld head focuses the arc around the intersection of the substrate and the object to be welded to it, essentially orbiting the perimeter. In applications that require greater precision or very small welds, mass flow controllers are employed and the arc is aimed through the manipulation of a field of conductive gas through an inert environment: as the tunnel of conductive gas moves, so does the arc produced by the tungsten electrode, allowing for near-molecular precision of the arc.
Orbital welding is employed because it has a number of advantages over torch welding – advantages that make entire technologies like mass-produced processors and solar panels possible. First, specially-designed weld-heads create a welding environment of near-perfectly pure inert “shield gas” (usually argon). An environment with such low PPM of atmospheric gas improves arc accuracy and ensures that the weld itself is free from contaminants that change the conductive properties of the widget. Second, small, sharp tungsten electrodes are able to focus current through a channel of conductive gas to create an arc that is smaller and more precise than the arc produced by any torch of any size. Third, because the arc is directed automatically to follow a programmed outline (some weld heads are even ’smart’ and ’see’ where the weld should go) welds are more consistently placed and executed with more consistent quality. And of course, because orbital welds are performed mechanically, they save producers the cost of employees to weld – irrelevant for semiconductor producers, since human welders cannot perform the orbital welds produced by the new technology.
While GTAW is not a new technology, the weld heads used in today’s clean-room environment are exemplary of technological advancements in machinery making the production – never mind mass-production – of new technologies possible.
Tags: orbital welding, orbital welding equipment, process welding
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Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
Industrialization and automation have taught us the value of machines: a good machine can do a lot more work than a person a lot faster and a lot more reliably. This truth isn’t limited to tractors or robotic arms either. As technologies advance they demand higher technology from the processes used to produce them. Semiconductor manufacturing provides a fine case study in manufacturing technology opening the doors to other technologies.
Introduced in the 1960’s to the aerospace industry, orbital tube welding equipment has allowed us to produce technologies that that would be impossible to produce with even the most adept human welders. Chips, solar panels, and even standard electronic equipment require microscopic welds without any contamination that cannot be executed by the human eye or human hands with a regular arc. Even larger applications like the fitting of large aircraft parts together benefit from the special qualities of today’s orbital tube welding, without which welds would be of inferior quality and consistency.
Today’s equipment improves on older equipment and human hands in a few ways. First, orbital tube weld heads create a near-perfect inert environment in which the arc operates by creating a near. This practically eliminates any contamination of welded materials with atmospheric gasses that can cause a change conductive properties or cause warping – in other words, new weld heads greatly reduce contamination that could render many finished goods useless. A more inert environment also serves to keep arc length and direction consistent, which ensures the weld is more accurately implemented. Second, advances in gas purification make it economically possible for manufacturers to use high-purity gasses. Purer gasses greatly reduce contamination and, in the case of the arc, keep its size and temperature consistent to create a uniform weld. Next, in conjunction with an MFC, arc machines and weld heads can create a microscopic arc. This arc creates similarly small welds that are necessary to keep components small and to conserve their conductive properties. And because arcs are rotated automatically by new equipment, precision is greatly improved over less dextrous human hands.
In sum, new equipment for orbital welding has made the production of new technologies possible. By reducing the risk of contamination and improving the precision and consistency of welds through technology and automation, the new technology provides a clear example of how unsung production technologies inform the invention of so many of the products we rely on in our day-to-day lives.
Tags: orbital tube welding, orbital welding, tube welder
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Saturday, October 17th, 2009
Even though the past five years have given birth to the emergence of a slew of competing technologies – iPhone vs. Blackberry, E-reader vs. Kindle, Garmin vs. TomTom – many of these products share many components in common. While competition among component makers is fierce, the somewhat uniform demands of OEMs are putting pressure on component makers to create devices very similar to their own competitors’, which is turning the market for components into a commodity market – a market which, until recently, seemed too innovative and fragmented to succumb to the same fate of SEMs or memory manufacturers. Increased competition in a market that demands increasingly similar products promises to put pressure on prices and squeeze margins. Component manufacturers are therefore in the position of having to weather what will undoubtedly be a long sustained but not unending period of decreased pricing power. But with smart business planning, they can avoid the margin compression that has plagued peripheral sub-industries like the memory manufacturers or SEMs.
While raw material costs for high-tech production could see inflationary pressure from a surge in demand for components, prices for equipment used in production could also rise as equipment makers seek to capitalize on increased demand from component makers, whose profitability will only be realizable at a certain margin of production volume. Reducing equipment costs is therefore not just one of the only ways, but is also one of the best ways that component makers like semiconductor companies can maintain healthy margins during a time that will be a boon for volume but not for pricing. Companies that are able to able to create greater capacity for less than it costs their competitors while funding new technologies for use in new devices will be the industry’s winners.
Increasing capacity for less requires having a welding equipment and supply strategy that employs lower-cost equipment. One way producers can save is by buying re-manufactured equipment. In so doing, the best welding equipment and supply company for a producer to use is one that not only acts as broker but who also adds value through the restoration of the depreciated equipment with its own resources. A company that has expertise not only in selecting and selling equipment, but also in maintaining and restoring it, will be able to offer producers the best possible used equipment at the best possible price.
Tags: orbital welding equipment, used welding equipment, welding equipment and supply
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Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
Recent economic weakness has translated into weaker-than-expected demand for chips and other high-tech widgets, as companies and consumers cut back capital expenditures and discretionary spending. Yet regardless of whether the economy charts a ‘V’ or ‘W’ course going forward, Moore’s law ensures that consumes will be getting more technology for less, and that the long-term aggregate demand for chips, solar panels, and other electronic components is likely to increase and increase again.
With greater demand for chips and other components on the horizon, whether commodities like SDRAM or one-of-a-kind processors of touch-screen commands, manufacturers both domestically and abroad – particularly in Asia – will need to increase capacity will keeping capital expenditure in-line with the lower margins encouraged by greater competition in the space. To accomplish this, companies should consider the benefit of increasing capacity with remanufactured orbital welding equipment and gas delivery systems: purchased from the right vendor, used equipment can be of like-new quality at a fraction of the price of being new or remanufactured through an OEM.
Considering the high level of quality demanded from equipment used in processes involving GTAW, simply purchasing depreciated equipment is not advisable. The stakes are simply too high when volatile gasses are involved, and the cost of scrapping a batch is too high to leave the safety and quality of equipment to chance. Buying orbital welding equipment that is re-manufactured as opposed to plain used (the latter is acceptable for a few applications) – whether weld heads, arc machines, or any other piece of the welding process – is the ideal way to save money on like-new equipment. The best welding equipment repair companies will put equipment through rigorous testing to meet the same specification as a new widget.
Take note that buying directly from the re-manufacturer will save buyers even more versus buying from a broker or secondary vendor. Vendors are used by repair companies and other vendors of OEMs to move more inventory faster. While you can often trust the quality of these re-manufactured machines, you are likely to get a better price and better service buying directly from the re-manufacturer, who will be happy to establish a direct relationship with the end user and do well to be competitive on price, superior on quality, and exceptional on service and guarantees.
The new technological era will require more components than there is current capacity to produce. Winning manufacturers will be those who can increase capacity at the lowest cost, without sacrificing safety or quality.
Tags: orbital tube welding, orbital welding, orbital welding equipment
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Sunday, October 11th, 2009
Nearly all of our customers involved in semiconductor manufacturing or research have been affected by the recent downturn in the economy. Good business management dictates that capital expenditures ought to be the first expense to cut in order to keep margins as wide as possible. Yet cutting capital expenditures for many customers means not investing in building capacity for the future, or even cutting capacity during a glut amid what is sure to be a multi-decade bull market for semiconductor components and technology. Many echoes are heard of a common complaint: a new tube welder is too expensive to justify in light of current order volume and can be easily added if and when order volume justifies the addition.
Yet the savviest competitors understand that waiting until demand rebounds to increase capacity could make them late to the party, their potential feast of a lunch eaten by players who had the foresight or balance sheet to allow them to invest in capacity. For users of welding equipment in the academic or industrial environment, however, increasing capacity and keeping expenses in line need not be be mutually exclusive. Welding equipment can be bought used, re-manufactured, or even rented – all solutions that blunt the impact to the expense column of the income statement.
For manufacturers looking to add permanent capacity, investing in a re-manufactured tube welder will cost more than renting, but will be bring an asset onto the balance sheet that can be quickly depreciated for a high ROI down the road. Vendors that also specialize in repair and re-manufacturing can provide re-manufactured versions of any number of weld heads and other gas equipment.
For producers or researchers not looking to invest in long-term capacity but looking instead to deal with sudden surges in demand or a sudden need for tube welders and other welding equipment and supplies, renting equipment can make a good deal of sense, even though it doesn’t add an asset to the balance sheet. Smaller cash outflows and short-term rentals make it possible for renters to get the most out of their equipment while the getting is good.
Renters of welding equipment of all sorts should rent from reputable sources that maintain and restore all rental equipment. Other sources will often charge a premium since they act as middlemen between renters and rental companies, or they will not have the in-house expertise necessary to service equipment into like-new condition before it is rented out.
Tags: process welding, tube welder, used welding equipment
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Thursday, October 8th, 2009
Automated welding is a staple of the modern production environment. Yet different processes – i.e., implementations – demand vastly different tools. Automobile manufacturers, for instance, often employ laser or plasma welders attached to robotic arms – file footage many of us are familiar with from recent economic news. Other applications require greater sophistication so that the weld itself does not interfere with the functionality of the finished product.
For many of these applications, manufacturers’ materials and products require that welds not only be very precise or very small; many the weld itself – essentially a bond of melted material – must be free of contaminants or warping so that the finished good can function as intended. In the semiconductor manufacturing environment especially, the welding environment must be purged with inert gas to “shield” the arc from atmospheric gases that can make their way into the arc itself or contaminate the weld itself.
Executing this weld requires special weld heads that are capable of fitting tightly to the material to be welded – e.g., a tube, component, or substrate – to create a seal. The space around the weld is then purged with an inert gas or gas mixture. Gas argon is most commonly employed. The weld head produces a small channel of conductive gas inside the “shield gas” through which electric current is conveyed by a tungsten electrode, thereby creating an arc of consistent size and temperature. The channel of conductive gas and the tungsten electrode can be programmed to move according to precise instructions to execute a weld that is free contaminants and is consistent in quality – both properties being essential to the proper functioning of semiconductor components.
Yet weld heads are not only available for GTAW or TIG welding. As mentioned, there is a design suited to nearly any process (or otherwise the potential for an inventor to become very rich filling the gap), and energy for a weld can be conveyed through laser, plasma, etc.
When purchasing a weld head for a process, buyers who only consult with an OEM do themselves a disservice. Vendors of equipment from multiple OEMs have the expertise to choose the right tool for the process, and those who also have experience in repair and re-manufacturing may be able to offer a remanufactured weld head at a fraction of the price of a new one purchased from an OEM, without any sacrifice in quality.
Tags: weld head, weld heads, welding equipment and supply
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Monday, October 5th, 2009
For SEMs and semiconductor manufacturers alike, fixed costs represent a far greater portion of per-unit production cost than materials than it does in other businesses. Clean-room environments and gas delivery systems are expensive to build and maintain while substrate, tubes, and crystals are relatively inexpensive on a per-unit basis. Thus, margin expansion for users of the sophisticated orbital welding equipment is highly dependent on controlling fixed costs. Since process welding demands a certain uniformity in plant design and production process, it is difficult if not inadvisable (for safety reasons) for producers to trade-down to less apt and safe designs and equipment.
Used welding equipment, however, offers users with high production standards the opportunity to significantly cut per-unit fixed costs and expand margins. Used equipment – weld heads, gas cabinets, arc machines, etc – have the obvious advantage of being cheaper. But how can a buyer of used equipment feel sure about its safety and reliability in an environment that demands perfect reliability to guarantee the quality of hi-tech components and the safety of employees and equipment?
Buying used equipment from most sources is a crap shoot, especially if it is from the primary user. Inadequate maintenance may not manifest any immediate threats to safety or reliability, but depreciation can ultimately reveal itself at the worst of times – in production – to the secondary user. It is therefore advisable for buyers of used welding equipment to seek out equipment that has been maintained and/or repaired to new spec by the same maintenance, repair, and re-manufacturing expert. This will provide assurances for quality and safety in a few ways. In the case of equipment that has been maintained by a welding systems repair specialist, there is an assurance of quality and safety that comes with knowing that the equipment has essentially always been kept in like-new condition, and will continue to be kept in that condition through a guarantee to buyers or through additional value-added maintenance services. And in the case of repair or re-manufacturing, there is the promise of quality and safety that comes from using a trusted specialist in the business to make a piece of used equipment like-new: good reputations for repair and re-manufacturing speak volumes in a business where there is no room for error or deviation from spec.
Don’t let the cost of brand-new welding equipment eat away all of your profits. Look into purchasing used welding equipment at a fraction of the price. Manufacturers can expand margins without cutting the corners of safety and reliability that distinguish process welding operations from other, less complex ones.
Tags: used welding equipment, weld head, welding equipment and supply
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Friday, October 2nd, 2009
A basic orbital welding system is comprised of a gas delivery system, a power source or arc machine, and a weld head. The gas delivery system feeds gas to the weld head that contains a tungsten electrode. The electrode transmits electricity through a channel of conductive gas that is surrounded by field gas in order to create a consistently-sized arc that can be rotated around the weld head – as though it were in orbit – which is tightly affixed to the weld joint-to-be so as not to let atmospheric gas contaminate the field gas.
For gas delivery, many industrial welders choose to employ automatic gas cabinets, which safely and efficiently manage the delivery of expensive and volatile industrial gases, as well as simple inert gases used for purging and/or shielding like argon. The cabinet can mechanically operate a panel and is often programmable by an on-board touch-screen computer interface that can manage a number of different processes and easily transition between process as required for different batches.
As far as providing current to the weld head, an arc machine is necessary to ensure consistent arc length and temperature. Different mixtures of gasses used in TIG welding respond differently to different configurations of current delivery. The current delivered by arc machines is easily programmed to provide whatever is necessary for a specific process as far as arc length and intensity for any number of conductive gasses.
The gas delivery system for orbital welding is generally anchored in an automatic gas cabinet that manages purging and delivery. A touch screen interface allows for the management of gas flow and purge cycles, and the panel can easily integrate an MFC internally, or an MFC can otherwise be placed at the process site as an intermediate step to the weld head for applications that require precise amounts of gas, the output of which can often be measured in flow of mere molecules per millisecond.
For GTAW process welding, all three main elements – the delivery system, the power source, and the weld head – must work in concert to achieve the desired results. Buyers of welding equipment are well served by consulting with the same vendor for all three components, since certain configurations are best suited to certain processes. Since many OEMs specialize in just one component of the welding process, a vendor that deals in all aspects is well worth a slight value-added premium because significant cost savings can be realized from the selection of the perfect part for the process.
Tags: arc machine, orbital welding, orbital welding equipment
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Tuesday, September 29th, 2009
Whereas for many industrial welding applications a welder may manually control gas flow to achieve satisfactory results, process welding in the clean room environment requires greater precision – precision that can only be achieved with the use of reliable and sophisticated gas delivery systems.
Automatic gas cabinets play an essential role in creating efficiency and safety in the operating environment. From the standpoint of efficiency, the automation of gas panel operation eliminates the need for a dedicated human operator. Spent tanks can be automatically purged, and integrated MFC’s can precisely regulate gas flow to processes that require precise amounts of gas, such as process welding. Furthermore, software in on-board computers can be programmed for different gasses and production sequences, making each cabinet as versatile as a human operator but as reliable as only a machine can be .
More than just reliability, automatic gas cabinets provide the sort of no-error safety that is required in the clean room environment. First, integrated leak and heat detection systems located much closer to the gas source ensure that any issue is addressed sooner than it might be otherwise be detected with manual operation. Second, integrated safety equipment like sprinklers and emergency shut-offs in the gas panel are instantly triggered by the on-board computer in the event of an incident. More rapid response translates into greater safety for plant and producers, while automatic purging reduces risk to cylinder handlers.
The versatility of automatic gas cabinetry also makes it ideal for managing the delivery of gasses for welding in the clean room environment. Cabinets with different cylinder capacities can be fitted with any number of manifolds, panels, mass flow controllers and computers that best suit their intended use or provide the greatest versatility for a number of different batches or processes. Cabinets customized for a specific process like orbital welding offer reliability that allows manufacturers to realize the most profit and least loss from a loss-less production cycle and a level of safety that reduces the risk of stoppage due to incident or – even worse – a gas or fire crisis that damages the clean room environment or harms employees.
For users of dangerous industrial gasses like phosphene and chlorine, the management of gas deserves great attention for safety reasons alone. In complex applications like the welding processes of semiconductor manufacturing, gas delivery requires even greater nuance – nuance that is most safely and reliably implemented by an automatic gas cabinet.
Tags: orbital welding equipment, process welding, tube welder
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