There are two reports in this issue of Welding Design & Fabrication on technological developments about the ways that off-highway equipment is being produced competitively in North America that have lessons for many areas of welding and manufacturing.

The first, is on the installation of a new robotic welding cell at the Volvo Motor Graders division in Goderich, Ontario, Canada. That welding cell is producing components for graders that weigh a minimum of 2,000 pounds. and have welds that range from 4 inches to 9 feet in length.

The cell is one of five being used on the new grader that Volvo is making at its plant, and no human welder has ever laid a weld directly on that new model.

The robot has improved reach, repeatability and accuracy over human welders, so it produces a better grader with fewer people.

Only two operators now are needed to program the cell, but with the robotic welding cell as their tool, those two operators are producing the work of as many as 11 human welders on Volvo's production line.

That type of productivity increase is possible with advanced robotics, and it's necessary to keep a company such as Volvo competitive.

Separately, a report on Caterpillar, takes a look at an entirely different use of technology, and points out how important people are — and will remain — in the production process. Caterpillar has developed an extensive, inhouse computer network designed to build a community within the corporation while capturing the knowledge of its people. That network provides an information highway that facilitates dissemination of the corporation's combined know-how throughout its worldwide operations.

In addition to offering global design reviews, system evaluations and a host of engineering functions, Caterpillar's intercompany Knowledge Network gives everyone within the company the ability to ask and respond to questions that can range from the most technical to the simplest.

The corporation's Knowledge Network is another tool that relies on technology to help to keep the company competitive. It represents a corporate acknowledgement that people — and what they know at every level are some of Caterpillar's most important assets, and that preserving and advancing those assets will help to ensure the corporation's success.

Caterpillar's Knowledge Network has a direct parallel in the public domain in our own WeldingWeb Internet site www.weldingweb.com

Caterpillar's internal knowledge base and the WeldingWeb both recognize that the experience welders have is indispensable and a valuable resource, and that a technically-oriented community can use computers to disseminate good information for the good of all.

The difference is that Caterpillar's Knowledge Network is — understandably — restricted to that company's employees and contractors while access to the WeldingWeb Internet network is open to all.

Both Volvo and Caterpillar are using technology to stay competitive, and their decisions are characteristic of manufacturing today: They are taking advantage of the impact that people have on their products.

Volvo reduced the number of people on its production line, but made the fewer remaining people more important; while Caterpillar saw the impact of its people and moved to capture what its people know and pass it on to as many people inside its corporate walls as it can.