Member Article

Yorkshire company partners with client to bring automated welding to UK fabricators

A long-standing customer/client relationship has transformed into an exclusive partnership for Wakefield-based structural steel and machinery equipment manufacturer Ficep UK, who has announced an exclusive partnership in the UK with Austrian company Zeman Bauelemente Produktionsgesellschaft mbH to supply automated welding equipment to steel fabricators.

The deal enables Ficep UK to offer a comprehensive and complete range of steel fabrication machines to customers, making Ficep the leading supplier for steel fabricators wishing to invest, upgrade or expand their operations.

Zeman, who initially started by offering rollforming machines, developed a fully-automated systems to assemble, tack and finish weld structural members for building fabrication, improving productivity and reducing the manual operation requirement - two benefits which feature heavily in Ficep’s own range of machinery.

The new partnership includes a deal to supply Zeman’s advanced automated plate component sorting storage system - the SPS. The system automatically picks fittings produced from thermal plate processing machinery and allows each part to be accurately scanned by laser for size, the system automatically recognises the part identity, picks up the part with a robot and transfers to a storage system with up to 40 bins and deposits it in the required bin depending on contract, job, or processing requirements. With the additional ability to allocate bins to the required location or fabrication bench within a factory and completely track the process with RFID technology, it’s a system which could transform plate processing operations in steel service centres and steel fabrication companies alike.

Mark Jones, MD of Ficep UK said:

“Both our existing and new customers now have access to an unrivalled range of Industry 4.0 ready, steel fabrication machines that will improve their productivity, reduce costs and improve quality, production capability and processes in steel fabrication. The overall plan is to provide fully automated factories for the future with our technological expertise and innovation for the steel industry.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sara Hawthorn .