The (Welding) Tools of the Trade

 

The fast-paced marine industry faces constant demands for efficiency and productivity – both from its workers and the equipment they use. That’s why, five years ago, MetalCraft Marine embarked upon a much-needed welding equipment upgrade when it discovered that the machines spent more time in repair mode than in active production. 

 

The Kingston, Ontario-based integrated designer and builder of custom, high-performance, aluminum workboats, which also operates a U.S. facility in Cape Vincent, New York, has fabricated boats for firefighting, marine patrolling, search-and-rescue and related functions since 1987. Today, the $20 million company supplies numerous government agencies, including the U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard and various local and regional port authorities. Although 70 percent of its customer base is in Canada and the United States, MetalCraft Marine also services international customers in Oman, Zambia, Kuwait and Australia. The company employs a staff of 140 in Canada and 17 in the United States. 

 

Because of its prominent and demanding customer base, the company took a hard look at its production equipment in 2009. The advanced age of its existing welding machines necessitated increasingly frequent maintenance, repairs and proper calibration, and replacement parts were getting harder to find. In addition, the older units were larger and heavier, and they often got in the way of operations.

 

Energy consumption of this older, less efficient equipment also created impediments to overall workflow. The old machines drew a full 30 amps whenever they were running, limiting practical use to only four machines running at a time. At risk? Productivity, something MetalCraft Marine was not willing to sacrifice.

 

“Four machines are enough for one metal team, and there’s one team per boat, so we could only weld one boat at a time, or two at a time at a slower pace,” noted MetalCraft General Manager Michael Allen. “This, combined with the frequency of the equipment breakdowns would often put us behind schedule.” 

 

It was time for the company to plot a course toward more reliable equipment, lower operating costs and more efficient processes for welding the aluminum, mild steel and stainless steel used in its fabricating processes. Regardless of materials or types of welds, aesthetics also plays an important part of the MetalCraft Marine work ethic. Sound welds may be the backbone of a well-constructed boat, but every member of the MetalCraft construction team also takes pride in the appearance of every weld on every panel. Allen and his crew saw this pertinent need for an upgrade as a way to advance operations and product quality.

 

“In addition to improving production efficiencies and reducing energy costs, adherence to quality standards in the midst of updating equipment and processes was a big concern,” Allen said.

 

The older equipment on the production line had been in use for close to 20 years, and didn’t feature modern technology, Allen said. At first, he said the crew was apprehensive about the idea of upgrading to welding equipment with built-in intelligence.

 

“It was a new concept,” he said. “We really didn’t know what to expect and didn’t initially know how to operate it.”

 

Another concern during the equipment-specification process focused on advertised quality. MetalCraft already had established an industry-leading 10-year warranty on its hull seams, and the company remained committed to maintaining that warranty during the transition process.

 

“We had to make sure we did not fall behind in terms of quality so that we could continue to offer that warranty,” he said. “The transition process wasn’t simply a matter of bringing in a new piece of equipment and taking an existing one out. We had to make sure we were defining the right procedures in terms of weld speed and operations so that the quality of the work did not suffer, and in fact, continued to move forward.”

 

Typical materials used in the fabricating process also played a role in equipment specification. The vast majority of alloys used in production, roughly 97 percent, are aluminum. Other materials include the occasional mild steel, at 2 percent, and stainless steel at no more than 1 percent. Thicknesses of these welded substrates can range anywhere between 5/32 to 1 inch, with welds mainly falling into butt and fillet categories along with the occasional plug weld.

 

While searching for the equipment, Allen and his team discovered Lincoln Electric’s Power Wave S350 welding power source. They soon learned that, through hands-on use along with the Power Feed 25M wire feeder, the Power Wave dramatically improved energy efficiency at the Kingston facility - enough for MetalCraft to run eight machines at a time rather than just four.

 

“We were able to double our weld output per day and even tripled it in some cases,” Allen said. “The machines only drew between eight and 12 amps most of the time, even when they all were working, so our house power didn’t need to be adjusted.”

 

The solution, however, included more than just an infusion of new equipment. It also delivered technical welding support and on-site education to Allen and his crew - helping them feel more comfortable with the new, “more intelligent machines” they had selected, from specification to the first production run.

 

“Lincoln Electric spent four or five months returning periodically to work with our welders to bring them up to speed and identify any tweaks that could be made after we brought the machines on board,” Allen said, adding that this assistance focused on both the welding power sources and the peripheral equipment, including the welding guns. “They worked very closely with us to get exactly the right solution from start to finish – including helping us redefine our welding procedures to take full advantage of the new and more advanced equipment.”

 

One such redefinition came in the realm of consumable selection. New welding power sources, which can be optimized for material type and thickness, wire type and diameter, shielding gas blend and welding position, can now be closely matched with a particular welding wire to maximize deposition, travel speed or weld appearance. Here, this meant trying Lincoln Electric’s SuperGlaze 5356 aluminum MIG wire, which Allen said delivers consistent performance and ease of use he sought, while also adeptly addressing productivity and quality needs.

 

“I don’t have problems with porosity or any of the other issues associated with poor weld-wire quality,” he said. “SuperGlaze is consistently good, and that’s what I’m looking for in terms of weld wire. Since then, I was approached by another company to try a different type, and I said I wasn’t even interested.” 

 

The quantifiable and dramatic improvements in MetalCraft Marine’s overall operation were almost immediate, Allen said.

 

“The Lincoln equipment, and the consulting advice that came with it, probably enabled us to improve our aluminum welding efficiency by 20 percent,” he said. “That’s a 20 percent reduction in the time it takes to build a boat.”

 

Allen estimates that the new machines paid for themselves in less than a year, with noticeable weld-quality improvements - less rework, better weld appearance, fewer quality inspections required and improved efficiencies. 

 

“With the old equipment, the guys were spending a lot of time changing the parameters on the machine and just making things work instead of having the right tools to do the job,” he said.

 

What’s more, the utility savings has enabled Allen’s crew to double its welding capacity. 

 

“The Power Wave uses less power draw than other technology we had been using previously,” he said. “When we were getting ready to make this changeover, one of the big initial sway points was the fact that the Power Wave required less electricity and could accommodate fluctuating loads of electricity in the local area. Our electrical supply isn’t all that stable, so that has allowed us to increase capacity right away.”

 

The increased capacity to build more boats at a level of quality that meets or exceeds the terms of the company’s 10-year warranty equates to an increase in sales by more than 300 percent over the past five years, Allen said.

 

The MetalCraft Marine story doesn’t end with that upgrade, however. The company also worked with Lincoln Electric engineers to install a fume-extraction solution, and Allen said that he continues considering ways to improve welding productivity on the line. One possible solution: installing a Lincoln Electric Advanced Module that adds AC TIG, high-frequency TIG and AC MIG welding capabilities to the Power Wave machine. 

 

“We think that has some real potential,” he said. “We don’t need a TIG welding machine full-time, but every team – which consists of about four to five welding machines – at some point needs to do some TIG welding. So it could be a big benefit by giving us flexibility without requiring a huge investment.”

 

About the Author
Elliott Ash is Lincoln Electric's Product Manager – Aluminum Process Solutions