Survey of robotic seam tracking systems for arc welding

Abstract

One of the main precesses of robot arc welding is the consistency which needs to be maintained while making part after part.Movement of a weld seam can be the results of various manufacturing process,such as poor fixturing or variations in the metal forming process.A standard robotic arc welding system does not have the ability to see the changes in the joint location.So an independent method of finding the location of the weld seam must be used to provide the robotic system with information to adjust the position of the weld path.This paper will give an overview of four of the common robotic arc welding sensor processes used today.