Differences Between Traditional Robots and Cobots
Traditional welding robots and cobots differ fundamentally in their operation and interaction with human workers. Traditional robots operate autonomously within caged areas, requiring a clear separation from human activities to ensure safety. On the other hand, cobots are designed to share the workspace with humans, with safety features that allow for close interaction. The intuitive control systems of cobots enable easy programming and operation, making them extremely easy to program and use. In addition, cobots are compact and provide the flexibility and scalability to handle new tasks in a matter of minutes.
PhotonWeld Cobot and Robot Laser Welding Solutions
Laser Welding for industrial robots and collaborative Robots
Upgrade your Arc Welding robot/cobot to laser welding
PhotonWeld Master R8-X Laser welding upgrade Packages
Install our Laser Welding Units on the Robot/Cobot of your choice
PhotonWeld Master R8-X Laser welding NEW equipment Package
PhotonCube : ready Made modiular Cobotized Laser Welding Cells
Ready made, flexible, economical Laser welding Cobotized production Cells
The future of welding isn't hiring more welders.
New handheld laser welding technology becomes a must. - Automation is no longer optional for welding shops - Robot Laser Welding will be soon the new standard!
The welder shortage is real.
Labor costs are rising.
Skilled welders are harder to find.
Cycle times are under pressure.
Lasermach's handheld laserwelding machines combined with our robot/cobot laser welding solutions are our answer — compact, mobile, fast, economical and ecological correct, simple to program, and built around our fiber laser technology.
PhotonWeld handheld fiber laser welders deliver super fast TIG-quality results on steel, stainless, aluminum, copper and much more metals — and any operator can learn it in hours.
The problem: you can’t hire your way out of welding
The solution: a collaborative robot that welds
Welding is a licensed, high-skill trade — but the work means dust, heat radiation, and genuine danger. The result is a structural labor squeeze:
- Hard to hire, hard to keep. Certified, experienced welders are scarce and getting more expensive every year.
- Unstable output. When a critical process depends on individual skill and stamina, both throughput and weld quality drift.
- A dangerous environment. Keeping people in that environment is increasingly hard to justify when an alternative exists.
A collaborative robot takes over the torch. It is compact, flexible, and space-saving, and you program it by drag-to-teach rather than code. A welding software package handles the rest:
- Fast connection to the welder
- Weld-mode selection
- Quick configuration of arc-start / arc-end parameters
- Real-time monitoring of welder status
The cobot tracks the seam steadily, with high path accuracy and stable travel speed, producing even, clean welds whose consistency far exceeds manual work. For joints a fixed-base robot can’t reach, an external travel axis dramatically expands the working envelope, so a single cell covers far more weld points — long seams and large workpieces included.
The results: fast, measurable payback
- Logistics-equipment maker — replaced a manual welding station with a 5 kg collaborative robot and recovered the investment in Nine months, with markedly better weld consistency and broader point coverage via an external axis.
- EV-battery producer — paired a cobot with a laser welder for battery-shell welding; stable speed and high trajectory accuracy produced uniform, attractive seams and payback in as little as 6 months.
Flexibility and low heat input are the real win
Switch between small batches and many variants on demand, and pull workers out of a harsh, dangerous environment. Quality, capacity, and safety improve together — not at each other’s expense.
Welding robots significantly help manufacturing companies reduce production costs and greatly improve working efficiency compared to manual welding.
▶First, welding robots run 24 hours a day non-stop without fatigue, breaks, or sick leave. Unlike human welders who can only work 8 hours per day and need rest shifts, robotic welding lines maintain stable output around the clock. For example, in automotive parts production, one welding robot can finish 300 chassis welding pieces per day, while a skilled manual welder can only complete about 120 pieces in the same time. The production efficiency is more than doubled.
▶Second, they cut labor and training costs drastically. Factories no longer need to hire and train a large number of professional welders, nor pay high salaries, insurance and welfare for manual workers. Meanwhile, welding robots keep consistent welding quality with almost no errors, spatter or rework. Manual welding often has defective products due to unstable operation, which wastes raw materials like welding wire, steel plates and gas. A machinery manufacturing factory can save 15%–20% of material waste cost every year after using welding robots.
▶Third, robotic welding lowers later maintenance and safety costs. It avoids work injuries, high-temperature occupational diseases and safety accidents caused by manual welding in harsh high-temperature and smoky environments. Fewer safety accidents mean lower compensation and management costs for enterprises.
In short, welding robots bring higher output, lower labor cost, less material waste and more stable quality, becoming an essential tool for modern factories to upgrade production.
Laser Welding for Robot and Cobot
Industrial Robots
ROBOT
Colaborative Robots
COBOT
Laser welding opens up entirely new design possibilities for component construction.
Laser Welding In Sheet Metal Fabrication
- Laser welding opens up entirely new design possibilities for component construction.
- Laser welding is a key development of the sheet metal process chain.
- Only laser welding makes this possible.
- The heat input is low and the heat effctive zone is minimal at high welding speeds.
- Laser welding connections are both visually and structurally attractive, and 5-10 times faster than conventional processes.
- Warp is minimized and expensive refinishing is almost completely eliminated with wobble laser welding.
- Laser welding seams are very narrow and have no heat influence zone, this minimizes warping when joining parts.
- With heat conduction laser welding, seams can be made with high quality.
- Additional refinishing, like grinding and polishing, are no longer needed.
- Simple-to-assemble clamping systems ensure a narrow joining gap and guarantee consistency.
- Valves controlled with compressed air or under pressure protecction gas make automated fabrication a possibility here, too.
WHY INTEGRATE ROBOTIC WELDING CELLS?
How to integrate our laser welding units in your robotisation to improve your welding cell
Robotic welding is one of the most common robotic applications in the industrial sector, being driven mainly by the automotive sector for the last several decades. Robotic welding is most productive when completing high-volume, repetitive welding tasks. With the new flexible robots and cobots small batch production and even single part production is in reach of any robot with Wobble-R Fiber laser welding units from Lasermach.
With robotic welding integration, you can:
- Decrease Employee Risk to Burns & Hazardous Fumes
- Increase Quality & Consistency of Welds
- Decrease Time Required to Finish The Job
- Decrease Space Needed to Perform Tasks
- Decrease Labor Costs
with integration of our predefined Wobble-R units, you can:
- Decrease even more Employee Risk to Burns & Hazardous Fumes
- Increase Quality & Consistency of Welds
- Increase drastically the welding speed
- Decrease Time Required to Finish The Job
- Decrease on a huge scale the post processing of your welded parts
- Decrease drastically Labor Costs
- Decrease Heat-affected zone (HAZ)
Laser Welding Upgrading Kits from PhotonWeld for TIG/MIG/MAG Welding Robots
Many exisiting industrial laser workstations and robotized TIG/MIG/MAG welding cells retain a solid mechanical foundation, yet their control electronics, safety modules, or welding sources no longer align with current manufacturing requirements. This leads to reduced process stability, limited functionality, quality issues, too low production speed and increasing operational costs.
PhotonWeld provides perfect retrofit solutions that modernize existing MIG/TIG/MAG welding cells without the need for full system replacement. The upgrade involves integrating new-generation laser sources, ultra modern and efficient laser welding heads, advanced control and safety electronics, optional real-time monitoring capabilities, optional real time seam tracking and enhanced automation interfaces.
Our modernizations deliver:
⚙ drastic increased production speed
⚙ Much better energy efficiency and drastic lower energy cost
⚙ improved process accuracy and repeatability;
⚙ higher operational reliability;
⚙ extended equipment lifetime;
⚙ compliance with modern industrial standards;
⚙ avoidance of costly complete system renewal.
⚙ Huge cost reduction
Significant productivity gains with our laser welding units
Lasermach provide full predefined units to replace any conventional welding system on any production line or automated machine.
Laser welding is an unknown or unexplored option for many manufacturers with automated welding applications, but it is just as easy to implement as other robotic welding systems. The fast travel speeds and low heat input of laser welding makes it especially well-suited for sheet metal welding applications that require precision and attention to aesthetics.
For operations now using MIG, TIG or resistance spot welding, a switch to laser welding can significantly improve productivity — saving time and money while still producing high-quality welds. Implementing our Wobble-R units in your exisiting Robot welding line is a piece of cake. It will increase your output, quality and savings while it reduces in extremis the postprocessing of your workpieces!
