Plastics & Metal Welding Assembly

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DETROIT—The Aluminum Association has published a free, comprehensive manual that details the range of joining technologies for assembling aluminum parts in automotive applications.

DETROIT—General Motors uses seven joining methods—including spot welding, laser welding, self-piercing rivets and flow drill screws—to assemble the aluminum body of the new Cadillac CT6 sedan.

SOUTHFIELD, MI—The automotive assembly line of the future will be more flexible, more capable of handling new materials, and make greater of the mobile technology, says Martin Kinsella, director of advanced materials and process technologies for systems integrator Comau Inc.

New technologies are making MIG welders a good option for joining aluminum.

Although it’s one of the world’s largest manufacturers of construction machinery, the Liebherr Group believes strongly in decentralization.

FARMINGTON HILLS, MI—Alcoa Inc. says it has solved one of the biggest wrinkles automakers wrestle with when stamping aluminum body panels: formability. The company has developed a new manufacturing process that produces aluminum sheet that is 40 percent more formable than current aluminum alloys.

ANN ARBOR, MI—Robot orders and shipments in North America set new records in the first nine months of 2014, according to Robotic Industries Association.

Innovative EOAT—ranging from magnetic grippers to micro tool changers—provides robots with many helping hands.

DEARBORN, MI—Two things are missing in the body shop of the revamped Ford Rouge Center, which includes the Dearborn Truck assembly plant making the 2015 F-150 out of aluminum: sparks and noise.

DEARBORN, MI—The first all-aluminum F-150 pickup truck has rolled off Ford’s assembly line here.