'Spot wise' electrode life extension using an innovative tip design and tip dressing

摘要

A simple and cost effective electrode has been developed which combined with an automatic tip dressing unit has enabled a dramatic increase in electrode life when spot welding coated steels. Using a specially designed electrode with dressing intervals of 200 to 400 welds, in excess of 60,000 welds were achieved with hot dip zinc, galvanneal, electro-zinc and baonazinc coated steels without any compromise to weld quality. It is envisaged that using the novel electrode design and the compact dressing unit, considerable savings are achievable in the electrode and manufacturing costs through a reduction in machine downtime for electrode replacement.