Pros and Cons of ultrasonic welding

Creating and promoting Iranian car brands and design and development of new cars are considered as the major achievements of Iran's automotive industry in recent years. The automotive industry is well experienced with the automation of resistance spot welding, but rarely an ultrasonic metal welding system. Ultrasonics is challenging because of the lack of experience and unfamiliarity with the process.

Pros and Cons
Several challenges confront engineers when using robots for ultrasonic welding applications. One concern is cycle time. If an application requires many weld points, the cycle time can become long.
On traditional sonic welding equipment with dedicated welders for each point, the cycle time can be very fast. However, on parts that have many welds required, the cycle time has to be considered to make sure it meets the desired production requirements. We can get around this by using multiple robots or multiple weld heads or part indexing, but each application and customer requirement is unique.
Another significant factor can be the potential added cost of robotic equipment. The upfront cost can sometimes be greater than dedicated machines. But, robotic sonic welding is not necessarily more expensive. There are a lot of factors that determine the cost compared to traditional types of assembly equipment. [It's important] to develop a system that can meet budget requirements without sacrificing future flexibility.
In recent years, the price of robots has decreased, while the variety of products and features has increased. The benefit comes from the end user's ability to reuse the robot for a new application. The advantage of a robotic cell is that it can be easily retooled for future applications. Manufacturers can run several programs in a cell vs. several dedicated cells.
If robotic ultrasonic welding were used for a dedicated product, then it could be more expensive. The reason to justify it would be cycle time. If the assembly process were tied to a moulding machine operation of say 45 seconds, and there were six welds to be accomplished, if the robot could accomplish the task in that time frame, then it's justifiable. If the welds take longer to accomplish, then a different process should be considered.
Payload capacity is another important consideration. A 20-kilohertz welding stack can be quite heavy. As the weight of end-of-arm tooling goes up, the cost of a robot typically increases.
End-of-arm quick-change tooling can be used to solve this problem, but this adds cost and complexity to the machine. Ideally, the end-of-arm tool should include a small-stroke air cylinder. This provides for significant improvement of weld performance and machine setup.
In an effort to reduce end-of-arm tooling weight, a special nodal-mount, high-gain horn [allows engineers to eliminate] a booster. This can reduce end-of-arm tool weight by as much as 30 percent.
Other factors that engineers should consider are programming, controls and fixturing. They must ensure correct alignment of the weld points, perpendicularity of the weld horn to the part, and consistent application of force by the robot.

Iran Khodro car platform
Iran auto industry targets the fifth rank amongst Asian car manufacturing countries. The same objective has motivated IKCO to start designing and developing its first CNG-electric hybrid powertrain
Turbocharged technology could be considered as one of IKCO's achievements in powertrain segment. The company's turbocharged engine is going to be mounted on Soren ELX in near future.
IKCO that possesses 50% of domestic market share has recently planned a comprehensive program to design and develop two new platforms and 11 new products within the next seven years. For instance we can refer to design and development of a Renault pickup and production of Runna this year and Dena early next year.
Platform design is IKCO's next step toBrowse All Brands