Re: Student Welding?
 

But, for the last few years at least, we have not done any welding for the following reasons.

A) It's a skill, not a trade. Either you are good at it or you are not. We don't have anyone on the team skilled enough to weld our frame nor do we want to weld our frame.

B) Time savings. - What takes an hour to weld (properly) takes a half hour to assemble after pre drilling and tapping holes.

C) It's not that easy to move welded pieces on your robot to allow for a modification in the pits.

D) Welds break. You can count on that. And when you break a weld at a competition, good luck getting it fixed before your next match. Been there done that. (2003).

Re: Student Welding?
 

On Cyber Blue we do all of our own welding. Two of us have been learning from one of our mentors. We can weld aluminum and steel. We have a whole welding station, including the awesome transparent orange curtain!

Re: Student Welding?
 

We can weld steel in our shop, but we get a helper/mentor to weld all of our aluminum, and he does a great job.

Re: Student Welding?
 

We had one student TIG weld our whole drive chassis, and this year we are doing all of our own machining on our mill, that now has a digital readout thank god, except for our wheel rims, those got water jetted.

Re: Student Welding?
 

It sounds like you just had a bad experience with weld joints. We've been welding our frames for years and as far as I know none of them have broken, and it's generally far superior to bolting the frame together (I wouldn't trust that to take a hit). It could be that the advisor who does the vast majority of our welding has about 30 years of experience. As for the poll question, there is one student on our team bold enough to weld inconsequential parts, the important stuff is done by that advisor.

Re: Student Welding?
 

All of the above.

Re: Student Welding?
 

We have a Lincoln Tig 185 in our shop, and this year we have a student doing extensive welding on an aluminum frame. We don't get a student with the required skill every year...

Eugene

Re: Student Welding?
 

While we've got stick and MIG in our shops, we have not yet got a TIG. In the past any aluminum welding we needed done we had done off-site by a professional welder. We tended to avoid aluminum construction for this reason, focussing instead on wood and composites that they students could fabricate with the tools that we had.

This year, however, we have a new teacher on staff who used to be a welder in his previous life, and he was able to hook us up with the TIG welder at a neighbouring school. We've been down there the past few days... and have been inspired to get a TIG unit for our school. The fact that we have our frame, motors (4 CIMs and KOP gearboxes), wheels, and a few other components assembled and are still only at 60lbs probably has something to do with our newfound enthusiasm for welded aluminum... and the welds just look so pretty!

I suspect we'll have one by the end of the week, and next year hope to have students who know how to use it. Another case of FIRST inspiring something good.

Jason

Re: Student Welding?
 

In, 2004, we had the local communtiy college welding instructor do it. In 2005, a shop that does high end bicylce frames did it. This year, I have no idea who it will be. We still haven't machined our frame, which we need to do before it is welded. We have no welder at school. A capable welder for aluminum is not cheap. I have access to large Miller Stick welders (old but quite functional) but you can only do steel (technically, you can do aluminum with a special rod but it is not recommended) and I've become quite proficient at using them. I have also had about an hour and a half's experience with a flux cored wirefeed welder and I think I could do MIG just fine. It seems easy.

I'm sure I could pick up TIG if I had access to a machine, but I don't.

(As a side note, has anyone ever stick welded an aluminum robot frame? How did it come out?)

Re: Student Welding?
 

I have experience with two teams right now.

95 doesn't generally weld anything. If a piece really calls for it, we have a few options but it's a rare event. There simply isn't enough access to the machines to make it worth while.

885 is blessed with both easy access to several machines with well stocked supplies and a very capable and experienced mentor. We make much use of his ability to TIG aluminum on our frame and anything else we need bodged together. I find that the weight savings alone make it worth while. While we only have one person who is capable of making a good weld, he's very good and quite fast. I would say that it's just as fast to give him a sketch and get the final product back as it is to go and bolt it up my self. It might be a little warmer, but we've got plenty of snow out back.

Given the choice, I will always go for the welded frame. Maybe a weld will break, but I've yet to have it happen. I have had bolts loosen up, strip out, end up to short, to long, bolt heads get in the way, holes drilled wrong, etc, etc, etc. When a good welder and a FIRST frame meet, it's a wonderful thing.

Besides, it's way easier to model a weld in Inventor. Thats how bad I am in Inventor. I'll choose the process thats easier to model.
-Andy A.

Re: Student Welding?
 

Are Welding is done by the students or are shop teacher if he has time..

Re: Student Welding?
 

We have a welder and we have a mentor who does most of our welding for the robot, but the students are allowed and encouraged to learn. I did last week.

Re: Student Welding?
 

Our machine shop mentor has begun teaching me this year to weld. I found out that it is alot harder than it looks. . . . but then again he just makes it look so easy.

Re: Student Welding?
 

I am responding to a serious concern. Our team feels that students should not be welded. Welding is a painful procedure that can result in permanent damage to the student being welded. Our team, Team 1719, much prefers Branding. This procedure is much less painful and causes less permanent damage.

Stop Welding now!

(In case you had trouble, I was JOKING!)

Paul Dennis

Re: Student Welding?
 

Cyber Blue 234 does all welding in house. This is our 2nd year of doing all welding in our own personal shop. A mentor taught me last year and pretty much all the welding done on our robot is done by me. It's a great learning experience and due to a family emergency last year the mentor was unable to attend after the third week so I was thrown into the fire alone and forced to do much of it on my own. I really learned to do it well because of that. I pretty much had to. We have a Miller 180 SD Tig Welder. It's a lot of fun.