WHEN YOU NEED EXPERT ADVICE.
We have material welding engineers on staff that can consult with you and determine the most effective solution to meet your needs.
Mobile Laser Cladding
Applying metal coatings using a precision laser to protect, repair, and extend the lifespan of parts.
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Our mobile cladding system can be deployed to the location where the component is installed or in operation, eliminating the need for disassembly, transportation, and reassembly. This dramatically reduces downtime, leading to significant operational savings in industries where every hour of downtime is costly.
Transporting large or critical components to a specialized shop requires extensive logistics and planning which can lead to delays. Our mobile cladding system eliminates these issues by performing repairs directly on-site, ensuring immediate service and avoiding potential bottlenecks.
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Our mobile cladding system reduces transportation costs, especially for large, heavy, or delicate components in remote or hard-to-reach areas. Companies save on transportation and handling costs.
Transporting a component to a shop typically requires extra labor for disassembly, loading, unloading, and reassembly. Our mobile cladding system reduces the amount of manual labor required, as repairs are done in situ with minimal setup. In industries where machinery downtime results in lost production, the ability to repair equipment without removing it from service for extended periods can mean significant savings.
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Transporting and handling large components poses risks to workers, especially during loading, unloading, and disassembly. By bringing the mobile cladding system to the workpiece, we eliminate much of this physical handling, reducing the chances of accidents.
CASE STUDY
A 25,000lb swing shaft was set up in a lathe to repair a bearing fit. The customer wanted to reduce the cost of repair by reducing machining setup time and transportation costs. Risk reduction was also front of mind as transporting the large shaft could cause damage to the spines on either end.
Figure 1: Shaft setup in the lathe.
Figure 2: Cladding of shaft inside mobile laser safety barrier.
Figure 3: Shaft after cladding.
Figure 4: Shaft bearing fit after machining.
Industries using Laser Cladding
An example of an Automated Repair Tool Path
To reduce both cost and turn around time Group Six has developed a more efficient repair process that uses a laser scanner and custom-developed tool path algorithms to repair and fill in worn out areas of components without pre-machining. The process eliminates pre-machining, decreases the welding time, and lowers filler metal consumption.
Advanced Technology
Mobile Laser Cladding
Applying metal coatings using a precision laser to protect, repair, and extend the lifespan of parts.
Automated Repair
In partnership with NRC, CCWJ, LIMBDA we have developed process and algorithms to increase the delivery and reduce the cost of parts that come in for repair. The process steps consist of scanning the candidate component, using custom algorithms to determine where and how much material is needed, planning the robot path, and adding the material with the laser.
Robotics
The third laser cladding cell we added was designed to reduce the human interaction needed for higher volume parts. It flips the traditional laser cladding cell on its head. Most laser cladding setups use a robot to take the laser processing head to the part that is placed in a rotary chuck or positioner. This works fine in a lot of instances; we have 2 cells that run this way. But, in our 3rd cell, the laser cladding head is fixed, and the robot brings the parts to the processing head. The advantages include, reduced operator involvement, faster processing times, and more reliable operation thus reducing costs to our customer.