Vectis welding cobot addresses labor crisis, rising costs

Vectis Automation, a Fort Collins, Colo.-based company with employees who have 60-plus years of combined experience in the robotic welding industry, is looking to help solve the lack of skilled welders. The company will debut at Fabtech, Nov. 11-14 in Chicago, the Vectis Cobot Welding Tool that is powered by a UR10e cobot from Universal Robots.

The Vectis Cobot Welding Tool comes with all hardware provided fully integrated onto a 3ft x 6ft mobile modular fixturing cart enabling metal fabricators to bring the cobot to the work, or the work to the cobot with no anchoring nor dedicated footprint required. This solution is designed for lower-volume, smaller manufacturers that need quick deployment and ease-of-use. It’s also available at a rent-to-own option to reduce the significant upfront costs typically associated with automation.

The Vectis Cobot Welding Tool can weld thick and thin parts. It also allows manufacturers to set weave parameters for tied-in welds with a Weld Template Library that provides parameter starting points for common weld sizes, such as one-click tack welds, square tubes with tight-radii corners, round tubes, and multi-segment paths.

The Vectis Cobot Welding Tool can set up by the customer within a few hours, the company said, and no programming expertise is required. Vectis’ programming interface is accessible through the UR10e’s teach pendant. Programs can be created, saved, and recalled to handle the numerous part numbers typical for high-mix, low-volume shops.

Vectis Automation said the system does not need three-phase power. It runs off a 120V wall outlet, and the welder can run on anything between 208V and 575V, including 240V single phase.

Here’s a rundown of everything that’s included with the Vectis Cobot Welding Tool:

• UR10e cobot with a 51-inch reach
• Programming on UR’s 12-inch teach pendant
• Air-Cooled Welding Torch
• Rhino Cart by Strong Hand Tools. Includes 66pcs of modular fixturing. Mobile worktable measures 30″ x 48″.
• Miller 20 Series digital wire feeder.
• Freedrive Jog Enable Button. Allows the programmer to teach the robot by physically moving the robot to program points.
• Miller Invision 352 MPa MIG Welder. Includes Pulsed MIG waveforms and weld parameters controlled by the cobot.
• Embedded safety: allows the cobot to safely work alongside humans, without permanent barriers.
• A 30-day return policy and rent-to-own program.
• Free application evaluations: A key part of the Vectis process is collaboratively reviewing applications to provide insight on application viability and how to achieve success in production. The company also offers suggestions on any upstream fabrication issues and/or how it could be redesigned to make it more automation friendly.
• Lifetime Technical Support.
• LTL freight: Most traditional systems require a costly dedicated air-ride semi.
• Flexibility: During production gaps in the weld shop, the cobot arm can be repurposed to other tasks.

“We saw Universal Robots prevail as the undisputed leader in the cobot market, lowering automation barriers through ease of use and fast deployment,” said Josh Pawley, Director of Business Development and Co-Founder of Vectis Automation. “We wanted to build our cobot welder on this platform, providing the same user experience to welders that manufacturers in many other industry verticals now enjoy.”

“We are delighted to be selected as the cobot of choice by a welding company with founders having more than 60 years of welding automation experience under the hood,” said Stu Shepherd, Regional Sales Director of Universal Robots’ North America division. “Vectis’ solution meets the ongoing welding requests we receive from customers. We look forward to seeing the company’s deep application expertise manifest itself in the cobot realm and can’t wait to share this expertise with FABTECH attendees and beyond.”

The BotX Welder is a similar cobot welding platform that runs on the UR10e. Developed by Hirebotics, the BotX Welder, also launching at Fabtech, has no installation costs; manufacturers pay only for the hours the system actually welds, which is in line with Hirebotics’ hire-a-robot business model.