Fastening, Joining & Assembly News

How about shipping a vehicle with its just installed 88 to 132 lb (40 to 60 kg) windshield whose adhesive cures en route, reaching full structural integrity on delivery? This concept for robotically applied structural adhesives is expected to go beyond glass to under-the-hood auto components, roofs, and doors. Admixing organofunctional silanes into adhesives makes it possible.

Assembling products with reactive silicone hot melt adhesives reduces assembly time, boosts performance, and minimizes cost. Recommended for bonding dissimilar substrates (glass, metal, plastic), the adhesive/sealants cure via heat, moisture, or ultraviolet light. Applications include auto headlamps, attaching circuit boards to polypropylene housings, bonding glass to frames, solar cells, and steam irons. For properties and application specifics review the Assembly article.

Targeted toward achieving zero defect ppm quality, a single fastener inspection system combines the latest linear crack detection technology (based on a magnetic signature) with 360° laser inspection that can measure dimensions at up to 16 locations along the length of the part. Out-of-spec parts are automatically discarded. For more features see Fastener Technology International (page 26).

Invented by a student-faculty team at Cal Poly, flexible fasteners possess lateral flexibility that make them suitable for non-parallel surfaces, misaligned/mismatched holes, and machine applications requiring small lateral movements (video). Made of almost any strong, flexible material, such bolts could find use in artificial joints, retrofitting, robotics, and seismic design. The patented Flexible Fastener is available for licensing.

Simulating assembly on the Boeing 787 not only saved production time but cut costs by 20%. Thanks to 3D simulation of final assembly that identified errors, design corrections were quickly implemented. The digital assembly line confirmed the value of utilizing accurate 3D models of parts and assembly tooling to significantly reduce rework, slashing an estimated entire year from production, says Manufacturingtalk.

For small to medium-size firms, robotic welding delivers the competitive edge in terms of competition, quality, productivity gains, and processing costs. These advantages may come in handy as the Canadian oil sands are harvested — a welding workforce shortage notwithstanding. Robotics took center stage at a forum on automated welding.

Latest funding for deformation resistance welding (DRW) is focused on furthering developments in dissimilar material joints, ferrous/nonferrous materials, and lean tubular structures for virtually any structural application: autos, bicycles/motorcycles, commercial/recreational vehicles, and mobile medical products. For NASA, the ultimate use is producing dissimilar joints, such as welding titanium-based cooling loops to stainless-steel power conversion components.

Continual evolution of digital stud welding points to smaller tools, higher precision, and more cost-effective joining says the Welding Journal. Power is controlled within ±2% and part tolerance is negligible, creating a more repeatable process that accommodates advanced features. Follow the link for "The impact of digital technology on stud welding" under the Processes & Materials section to download the article.

In building a house, labor is everything. But today, complex houses of gypsum and concrete can be built robotically in one day at one-fifth conventional construction costs says engadget. Not uncannily, the robotics hardware strongly resembles a large automated gantry like those used in the aerospace industry to build and assemble giant fuselages and wing structures.

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