Robotic mig cost estimates?

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It was announced today that a leading European manufacturer of racing karts (think 120 mph go kart) was opening a plant in Florida for the North American market.  Great news for making more things here.  The total volume sold in the US is pretty low compared to the rest of the world. The Italian plant is a thing of great beauty, all automated, CNC, pretty impressive.  I'm doing some napkin math to figure out how much it would cost to tool up the plant with robotic welders.  They use 30mm and 32mm tubing, pretty thin wall.What's a robotic mig capable of doing something like that go for these days?
Reply:That isnt a question you want answered by strangers, get in touch with a robot MFG and talk to a sales person.Have we all gone mad?
Reply:Originally Posted by sn0border88That isnt a question you want answered by strangers, get in touch with a robot MFG and talk to a sales person.
Reply:Back in the early to mid-2000's, the company I worked for bought an OTC/Deihin robotic AC mig, 250 amp for pulse mig welding aluminum extruded shapes into square and rectangular frames.  As I recall, with the robot, the mig power supply and feeder, the rotating table and all the jig'ing for the different parts we made on it and the enclosure around it was about a quarter million dollars, all said and done.  The robot, when running right, could do as much production in a day as 1 and a half manual welders, but it still took one skilled welder to operate it, so not really all that much labor cost saved by using the robot.  It did lessen the health impact on the welder, as the job was physically easier and safer.  When running right, the robot made perfect welds on every part.  When not running right, or when the parts were not cut/prepped right, it was a nightmare and alot of parts were wasted as scrap, or had to be re-worked by manual welding.Last edited by DesertRider33; 07-17-2010 at 11:03 AM.MM350P/Python/Q300MM175/Q300DialarcHFHTP MIG200PowCon300SMHypertherm380ThermalArc185Purox oaF350CrewCab4x4LoadNGo utilitybedBobcat250XMT304/Optima/SpoolmaticSuitcase12RC/Q300Suitcase8RC/Q400Passport/Q300Smith op
Reply:Thats about my exact experiance with robots DesertRider.
Reply:Yeah a robot has to have perfect fitup on all its joints where as a human can make corrections on the fly.
Reply:Originally Posted by down19992000Yeah a robot has to have perfect fitup on all its joints where as a human can make corrections on the fly.
Reply:I worked at an Eaton plant. It was a combination of three shifts of programmers, one of which sucked at his job(and life), incredibly poor maintenence and lack of support from management in correcting both problems that contributed to lack of production.Done right robots are amazing. Done wrong they are an unholy mother ****ing bitch.
Reply:If our operation had been fully automated, with other robots to load parts on the jigs and remove completed assemblies and send them to the next operation, our robotic welder may have been faster and more efficient, but would have cost another half a million dollars too for all that.  As manual welders, we were quite fast at our jobs.  It didn't surprise any of us that the robot was only marginally faster.  When management said the robot would be 3 times faster and take 3 welders off the line, we all laughed hystericly.  We were practicaly robots ourselves!MM350P/Python/Q300MM175/Q300DialarcHFHTP MIG200PowCon300SMHypertherm380ThermalArc185Purox oaF350CrewCab4x4LoadNGo utilitybedBobcat250XMT304/Optima/SpoolmaticSuitcase12RC/Q300Suitcase8RC/Q400Passport/Q300Smith op
Reply:manufacturing stuff in America?  USA is becoming china?i wonder if Europeans will look at these karts, and say, geez, i can sell four of my extension cords and buy one of these karts... **running and ducking for cover**
Reply:Originally Posted by sn0border88Not anymore, most new robots from ABB and Fanuc (I think) have seam tracking software built in.