Ultrasonic Metal Spot Welder Delivers Repeatable, High-Quality Results
The actuator’s dual linear bearings and a digital load cell enable Emerson Industrial Automation’s Branson GMX-20MA ultrasonic spot welder to deliver consistent quality from weld to weld by maintaining energy levels.
Posted: April 5, 2021
The Branson GMX-20MA ultrasonic metal spot welder from Emerson Industrial Automation (Brookfield, CT) bonds nonferrous metals including bus bars, foils, switches, and wire terminations in automotive electrical systems, electric vehicles, batteries and battery packs, power storage systems and related applications.
A rigid pneumatic actuator with dual linear bearings and a digital load cell ensure smoother vertical motion and more precise downforce control for maximum weld quality and repeatability. Actuator travel and tool positioning relative to the welded parts are tracked and measured using a linear encoder. Once tooling/part contact is made, a digital load cell measures and maintains a precise level of actuator downforce on the parts, ensuring weld energy is accurately delivered and consistent weld quality is assured from one weld to the next.
The programmable controls enable operators to manage the welding process in multiple modes: time, energy, peak power and distance. These versatile weld modes, together with the welder’s advanced digital controls, provide the added precision required to maintain tight weld process control despite occasional variations in part surface quality or cleanliness. In most cases, the ultrasonic tooling’s high-frequency lateral scrubbing action eliminates the need to pre-clean parts.
A user-friendly, touchscreen human-machine interface (HMI) housed in the Branson 2000Xd power supply/controller makes creating, editing and recalling stored production recipes fast and simple. The touchscreen HMI also accesses multiple welding control modes and enables operators to configure production- and quality-monitoring solutions.
The power supply/controller continuously compiles and stores extensive weld quality and traceability data throughout the production process. It also conducts amplitude stepping for optimization of weld strength and appearance, with built-in cycle counters to track production. Total cycle time can be displayed in the weld results screen, which allows operators to monitor key operating parameters. Visual quality screen (VQS) monitors and displays real-time quality data so that even small variations can be identified and corrected immediately.
