Special Purpose Machinery

Want to quickly get in touch with our team regarding Special Purpose Machinery? Contact us now to discuss your requirements.

When the existing process machinery on the market is unable to join the material your product requires in the way that you need it to, or when you need to create a tailored solution for your custom manufacturing process, you’ll need special purpose machinery to get the job done.

At ProSpot we take pride in our 25 years of experience as special purpose machinery manufacturers. We create custom welding machine solutions to solve complex challenges across a variety of industries. Whether you need an adapted design to work with a specific material type, or a one-off bespoke machine to develop a custom process, we can create the solution you need to fulfil your exact needs.

An experienced team on your side

Our skilled engineering team draw on their vast experience in Aerospace; Automotive; Oil and Pipe; Renewable Energy; and the Rail industry to provide a specialised service that includes everything from concept, design, development, and testing – to full documentation, operational procedures, and project completion. At every stage we’re driven to innovate and provide high-quality machine and system solutions, and customised configurations, with longevity built-in to enhance productivity, and maximise your return on investment.

Our Special Purpose Machinery process

Identifying your core needs

We’ll break down your manufacturing process into transformation phases, and work with you to establish the key critical areas you need to address with your final machinery – such as complexity of materials you need to work with and the tolerances (Cp and CpK) they require.

Building in operational requirements

We’ll then distil our concepts to match your operational requirements such as cycle time, reduction of labour, station footprint, and weld repeatability and integrity.

3D design concept consultation: We’ll design 3D concepts of your new special purpose machinery, and discuss these with you to make sure they meet your requirements before drawing up solutions using Solidworks and E-plan to agree the final design for your custom piece of special process machinery.

Testing your final product

As part of the evaluation process we are able to develop and test welds and joins prior to process commitment to ensure the robustness and surety of the welding customization / automation. Our shop is fully equipped with development welders, destructive weld test and weld integrity/fault metering to allow us to fully test your finished machine to make sure it meets your standards of quality and efficiency.

Our areas of expertise

• Specific material types – If your requirement is simply to handle very specific material types we specialize in both Ferrous and non-Ferrous solutions and also difficult Ultra High Strength material such as Boron steels in Hot and Cold stamped versions.
• Varied Joining processes – If you need varied joining processes we have extensive experience not only in resistance welding but also MIG, riveting, stamping, clinching and feeders.
• Additional quality control – in some cases, we can add leak testing and vision systems to provide you with additional quality control

Case Study: the SPR_XY_Machine –

Creating special purpose machinery for the automotive industry that is future-proofed for adaptability.

The client who came to us for the SPR_XY supplies the automotive sector with aluminium subassemblies for body reinforcement. They approached us at ProSpot due to our experience as special purpose machinery manufacturers, and gave us two core challenges for their new special purpose welding machinery:

• A custom joining solution, beyond standard resistance welding. Our client’s customers had high requirements for the end product, and with aluminium as the core material there was a risk that standard resistance welding would draw imperfections into the weld.
• Building adaptability into the design. The new special purpose welding machinery also needed to be future-proofed to produce a range of different product variants so that our client can develop new product lines and adapt to fulfil the changing requests and requirements of their customers when needed.

ProSpot’s solution

We consulted with the client and designed the SPR_XY – a special purpose machine with controls in a combination of both Siemens and Allen Bradley, that uses a self-piercing rivet solution for a cleaner join. This application, with servo driven X-Y tables, utilises quick interchangeable tooling to manufacture both left and right-handed parts. We also added sub plates to fulfil the client’s need for adaptability – with these sub plates included, our client’s finished special purpose machinery can adapt to produce a number of additional product variants.

The results

The final machine fulfilled both the client’s immediate joining need, and their future plans, while also delivering a reduced, compact footprint for maximum space saving; easy tool change for economic setup; and a fully optimised cycle time – all while minimising the complexities of riveting within a compact envelop.

Have an idea? Speak to our Special Purpose Machinery team.

Contact us to talk about your special process machinery requirements, and let our experts advise on the best way to meet your needs.