Automated welding technology
Salzgitter Mannesmann Forschung GmbH has developed an ultramodern welding technology for the production of nodes. The automation of the welding process leads to savings in production time and costs, while simultaneously improving product quality.
Absolute quality is essential in the welding of the nodes used in modern steel structures such as offshore wind jackets, where their reliability governs the strength and fatigue resistance of the complete structure. Poor welding and dimensional deviations would endanger the service life of the complete wind turbine and entail substantial risks for the sustainability of energy production.
To achieve advances in this field, Salzgitter Mannesmann Forschung GmbH has researched into and tested an automated welding technology under series production conditions. Various destructive and nondestructive tests on nodes produced using this process have shown significant superiority over conventional manual welding in both quality and productivity. Thus, extremely tight geometrical tolerances were maintained (angles, axes) and the weld geometry itself was excellent. In addition, the time required for welding was reduced by over 70% and the cost involved in the production of the nodes by about 30%.
