As in several European countries, young people in Ireland are more likely to choose studies over Vocational qualifications. As a result, there is a growing shortage of welders, plumbers, painters, etc. In addition, wage costs in Northern Ireland have risen sharply over the past five years and the supply of welders from middle European countries has been reduced by the Brexit. “For us, that was the moment to invest heavily in, among other things, laser cutting with automatic loading and parts removal, bar feeding to the CNC turning machines and welding robotization. In our search for a suitable robot integrator, we discovered that most providers focus on volume production. In doing so, the flexible welding robot solution offered by Valk Welding with offline programming of small series was a real game changer for us,” says Robert Nicholl of the family-owned company. “From the many examples Valk Welding showed and what we saw on the Vimeo videos, their specialism in the field of small volume production was clearly evident.”
