Pumps Manufacturer: Prototyped Pumps

Pump & Construction

The company has trusted us with a variety of projects from designing prototypes to long-runs. A recent project included fabricating demo units for trade shows, in order to illustrate their pump capabilities. 

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This specialty project required designing, prototyping along with fabrication of high quality welds with the intent of showing the craftsmanship of the overall pump system that the company delivers to their customers.

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A second project required that we prototype two versions of manhole doors. They had prototypes from another vendor that were warping because of the welding. You could push your hand down on the cover and it would spring up meaning the prototype welds were compromised. They requested that we redo two sizes of manhole covers, and build out two of each cover within a short timeframe. Three samples were then sent for a first certification of inspection. They were extremely happy and ordered a long-run.

The manhole door cover or maintenance hole cover is a removable plate forming the lid over the opening of a manhole, an opening large enough for a person to pass through that is used as an access point for an underground vault or pipe. It is designed to prevent anyone or anything from falling in, and to keep out unauthorized persons and material. However, you can see it is much more complex than a simple plate.

The prototype that we received from the vendor that was used had poor welding. It was clear that weld testing hadn’t been done because there was warping. Additionally, there had been cold rolled welding. Hot rolled bends more easily and can do sharper bends. A cold rolled, welded piece might start to crack when bent while a hot rolled, welded piece wouldn't.

 

Lastly, there was porosity, which is discontinuity; also called worming or wormhole porosity. It is a series of cavities that appear to go into the weld from the top down. It's important to understand that any weld with porosity is compromised and will seriously be lacking in structural integrity. So if any type of force is going to be exerted on your weld, it needs to be redone.

 

Additionally, there were long welds, almost three inches long and not evenly spaced. This caused additional warping to occur. We did one inch welding and evenly distributed them around the covers.

We used a welder that is known for its capabilities with welding aluminum. This welding machine was chosen because:

• reduction of human error by being able to program the heat specifications into it for repeated use

• Its ability to do aluminum welding, spatter-free & aesthetics similar to Tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding. TIG welding allows for the greatest operational control relative to MIG welding and creates stronger welds. TIG welding is more complex and difficult to learn, however, and is a much slower process than MIG welding

• our focus on bringing in innovative technology (ability to connect robotics into it)

• having a research center near our site. We recently did a full-day training to reinforce the capability with our four welders and AWS certified welding inspector as part of our ongoing training program

 

We have a quality inspector who reviewed each component of the piece prior to moving the piece to the next stage. Having each process spot checked increases the level of quality of the overall project. We sent three pieces for first certification of inspection. The team was very impressed with the quality of the updated prototypes, and ordered the long run.

• Prototype
• Reverse Engineer
• Long-Run

1. Manufacture Prints
2. Print Approval
3. Saw Cut
4. Notch
5. Machine Parts
6. Weld
7. Assemble
8. Prototype Evaluation
9. Mass Production

“I have worked with the team at Valence Industrial for years and everyone is great to work with. They have been a cornerstone supplier for many years and together we have been able to grow both, our business and theirs. We recently went to them with a large project for aluminum covers. Through working together we were able to get a product to the same quality that we were previously getting at a better cost.”

 

-Commodity Manager

$800M Revenue Pump Manufacturer