As the automotive industry continues to adapt to meet ever-changing regulation requirements around emissions, efficiency and weight — the role of fabricating and welding continues to evolve to help automakers reach key safety and performance goals.
Automakers can employ many welding methods for automotive applications including spot, resistance seam, metal inert gas, tungsten, laser beam, friction, and plasma arc welding. All of which are designed to perform highly intricate tasks and ensure vehicles are safe.
Local and Global Economic Trends
Organizations in the metal forming space rely on understanding and forecasting economic trends and market demands to align business strategies and keep revenue strong. This allows fabricators to focus on areas of demand and shift production accordingly.
When the economy is performing strongly, families and consumers are more inclined to spend their hard-earned money on bigger, lifestyle-driven purchases, such as cars and boats. Additionally, when the population grows – so does the need for food. When this occurs, fabricators and automakers will adjust to the needs of the agricultural and farming industry by producing higher performance utility vehicles that help to till the land, harvest crops, and pull necessary equipment across the land.
This uptick can signal a change in production quantities, but also manufacturing needs. As the production volume shifts, equipment needs to be well-serviced and calibrating to meet the changing demands — especially when we consider the critical nature that welding has on ensuring vehicle safety. Having a highly trained and specialized repair team can help automakers ensure their welding equipment is ready to handle these adjustments — that’s where Vern Lewis Welding Supply can help.
Material Changes
For years, automakers and suppliers have looked to one material to meet ever stringent regulations on fuel efficiency and economy — aluminum. Aluminum is highly sought-after for several reasons, but mainly for its benefits in decreasing the overall weight in the vehicle. Often, using aluminum for the body of the vehicle, whether it be a truck or sedan, can reduce weight by up to 50 percent, allowing vehicles to travel farther on less gas.
Not to mention, aluminum is stronger and safer, and environmentally friendly as 90 percent of the aluminum used can be recycled. Plus, by using advanced welding processes, noise can be significantly reduced.
Welding Technicians in Auto Sector
Over the past several years, the automotive industry has seen a significant change in the workforce and the ever-increasing gap in skilled welders. The ratio for welding technicians to automotive robots was once 1 for every 20, but now that ratio has increased as technicians must oversee the performance of upwards of 50 robots.
Many suppliers and automotive firms have helped automakers integrate new technologies to improve the welding performance of aluminum in production. This includes adopting robots and welding guns to create stronger welds using copper caps or coolant lines to keep temperatures lower during the fabricating process. This improves the overall safety and security of the aluminum and can help to increase productivity by preventing downtime. Plus, this process can also provide incredible accuracy as many robots are programmed to track the weld seam, which allows for exact precision that can be repeated every time.
With the heavier dependence on aluminum and fabricating processes, it is more important than ever for automakers to ensure their welding equipment is performing to the best of its ability. The team at Vern Lewis Welding Supply is here to help keep welding equipment in tip-top shape.
Call the Repair Experts in Arizona
In Arizona, Vern Lewis Welding Supply Inc. is one of the top certified repair facilities for all major brands of welding machines and equipment. Whether you are looking for general repairs or preventative maintenance such as testing, cleaning, filtering, and calibrating – our team of welding professionals can help your company keep productivity up and revenues strong by reducing down-time and ensuring your equipment is top-notch.
We also provide welding equipment rental and commercial delivery services. We have eight locations throughout Arizona, including Kingman, Prescott, Mesa, Wickenburg, Avondale, Phoenix, and Peoria. For repair services, contact our main service center at (602) 726-9445.
