Stahl Gerlafingen AG

Strecker Success Story Very high weld joint quality with
optimal employee safety

The challenge

To enable continuous operations, the end of one coil must be connected to the beginning of the next coil during production.

With larger wire diameters such as WR20, WR18 or WR16 mm reinforcing steel, it is very strenuous for operators to pull the wire ends to be welded out of the system far enough so that they can be joined in a horizontal line using a conventional welding machine.

After welding, the resulting wire loop must then be forced back into the system, and in the process the loop often becomes tangled and obstructs the pay off. Consequently, the company was looking for ways to optimize processes and at the same time wanted to relieve the operator of heavy physical labour.

The solution

Butt welding of hanging wire coils in the coil radius – STRECKER responded with a machine utilizing a vertical design which allows the welding head very close access to the wire ends needing to be joined, which makes the entire work process much easier.

The machine is designed in such a way that the wires are hydraulically clamped in the coil radius in the clamping fixtures, which eliminates the need for prior straightening. This electric double butt welding machine with automatic deburring, the "SS" in the vertical version, offers many advantages:

Strecker Typ SS120-FPC Vertikal Stahl Gerlafingen AG

Innovation from Strecker
Strecker Type SS120-FPC Vertical

Excellent weld quality due to double upsetting; nearly all the heated and therefore molten material is pressed out of the joint, which produces a weld with extremely high strength.
The automatic deburring integrated into the process provides welded joints with exactly the same diameter as the original material. Reworking through manual deburring is unnecessary, meaning the associated debris is eliminated. This is an enormous step forward considering that earlier, using conventional welding machines, the welding burr had to be removed through time-consuming, laborious manual work!

Automatic deburring means not only enormous time savings, but also simplification of the operator's work.

Additionally, there is no risk of wire breaks due to excessive deburring, i.e. a reduction of the cross-section at the welded joint.
Repeatable, exactly reproducible welded joints of the highest quality with the same diameter, even with difficult materials, form a solid, reliable basis for further manufacturing processes and contribute to quality assurance.
The machine offers simple, user-friendly operation even for personnel without special qualifications. This fact coupled with the relief from manual labour for the operator makes it possible to staff this position with just one person, meaning that required personnel capacities in production can be reduced.

The result

The use of the welding machine, especially with automatic deburring, has brought great improvements, especially in work safety during operations. Accidents during manual deburring in which employees had to be treated with foreign objects in their eyes, for example, have been reduced to nearly zero since these systems have been in operation.

Operators also appreciate the reduced effort required at the welding machine – the work is easier to handle and the entire workflow is simplified.

The welding process employs two upset actions which press the heat-affected material into the weld burr and thus out of the weld joint and ensure very high quality in the weld – which has also reduced the incidence of weld fractures.

The Customer
Stahl Gerlafingen AG

Stahl Gerlafingen AG is the leading Swiss supplier of reinforcement products and is a company of the Beltrame Group.
With currently around 500 employees, the company is a competent scrap recycling partner and produces around 625,000 tonnes of reinforcing and sectional steel for the construction industry in modern, technologically advanced facilities every year for the national market in Switzerland and for neighbouring countries.
Great importance is attached here to processes that are as environmentally friendly as possible.
The product range includes reinforcing steel, meshes, accessories, flat and wide flat steels as well as wire rod.

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