Spot Welder Supports

I would support the center and rigth and left side or the weld.

Use some type of rolling feed system with stops set for welding hinge joint. But then that is what we did when welding supports electric heater bodies.

There must be a reson they have it setup as they do. 1st ask why it is setup this way before you redesign it. If your assigned to redesign this it would still be a good idea to find out why they setup it up this way. Sometime one change on a production area has a chain reaction effect around the factory.

Sorry I forgot to sign in but i did want to add one thing. That setup in the picture does not scream high speed or high quanity production so some form of removalable setup to hold the doors in position maybe a better application. It is does not look like they weld more than 20 doors a week there.

You are correct in that it's not used very much, but based on what I've seen I would estimate they go through about 40 doors a day.

The engineer I am working under had another intern before me that designed that system. I don't think it is that way for any particular reason other than to give them some support for the heavier doors.

Thanks for the idea,

Matt

It's hard to tell the exact orientation, but it appears to be the doors are held horizontally. Is it possible to reconfigure the entire operation to hold the doors vertically? This would remove several obstacles...

Are you referring to the way they hold the doors when they weld them or the fact that the supports for it lay horizontal? In other words, are you asking if it would be possible to weld the doors while holding them vertical, or are you saying to try making the supports act in a vertical direction? Sorry I am just a bit confused with your wording.

I actually meant to weld the doors while they are held vertical, but the other way 'round, weld horizontally but grip vertically, might work too. Hard to say w/o being able to actually cycle the thing a couple of times. What's YOUR take on this, being as how you can go look at it...?

Thanks for your help and quick replies. I don't believe the first idea would go through as we'd have to turn the electrodes sideways and I think that would be difficult for the operators. As far as turning the support vertical--I was leaning towards that myself.

I'm very new to pneumatics and one of my other projects involves a pneumatic system. From what I've learned so far I think I could make a vertical support system. First thoughts were to cut a hole in the floor for a cylinder. This is to make the top of it flush with the floor. Then weld a support to the end of the rod. I'm pretty sure cutting a hole in the floor wouldn't a problem, but if our maintenance guys say no then I could always go with a bent design for the support.

This would be easily adjustable, such as a handle mounted on the table to control a double-acting cylinder. Only problem I foresee is the pneumatic cylinder not being strong enough to support certain doors, especially with a bent design.

Or were you thinking something a bit easier to construct?

Can you put the adjustable portion along the entire front of the frame? That way it is all one piece, so you don't have to adjust two sides at once, just one? The picture is a little fuzzy. ..could you send one with the machine being operated for a couple of different sized doors.

Here are a few more pictures. Sorry if they do not turn out right; the lighting is tricky in this place. First picture is blurry. Ignore the pieces of sheet metal on the four legs in the second picture; that is from my squat rack idea that didn't pan out (middle two supports got in the way + took too long to change). I have removed them.

Really important fact that I can't believe I forgot to mention:

They slide the doors along the supports as they weld. (Usually three hinges per door)

Most material I can get my hands on to support it with, though, is slick enough to slide across.