William Hughes invests £1/4 million in latest welding technology for automotive seat frames
William Hughes announces that it has invested over £1/4 million in a high technology twin robot welding cell.
The new welding cell was supplied by Bauromat with Fanuc robots, all installed at William Hughes new UK headquarters in Stalbridge, Dorset. The unit features advanced weld monitoring and recording ensuring that the highest standards of quality and consistency are maintained for its customers.
"We have been very successful in winning significant new business from our automotive customers and this has meant that we needed to increase our production capacity for our welded seat frame assemblies" said Emma Burgon Engineering Director, William Hughes. "The Fanuc twin robot welding cell was the obvious choice as we already have a number of Fanuc machines within our organisation and are familiar with their programming and operation. The twin robot version more than halves the time required for the welding process and this has provided a significant increase in our manufacturing capacity."
The welding cell is in operation 24 hrs/day during the working week and is currently being used for the bulk manufacture of seat frame backs for a SUV. This particular assembly has 56 welds and uses 25 wires. As well as the improved quality and consistency of the finished product provided by the twin robot cell, the welding process is much quicker enabling parts to be produced just 1 minute 40 seconds compared with 3 minutes 45 seconds previously. Furthermore, to ensure throughput speed is maximised, the weld jigs are all designed by William Hughes engineers using latest CAD software and manufactured using CNC milling machines.
