Friday, May 31, 2019

Brief History with Video Examples

Welty Automation contracts full time with Mestek, Inc. and works out of the engineering department in Cedar Rapids, Iowa factory location of Mestek Machinery. 

I grew up around automated sheet metal and coil processing equipment design and manufacturing. I first helped my father on a design project at around 16 years old; by programming a PLC to control a simple robot designed for use on a machine that produces downspout elbows. 

The robot took the elbows out of the machine, crimped the end, and drop the crimped elbow into a box positioned next to the machine to reduce operator repetitive motion strain.

This is a video of the newer version of that machine and robot which improved on my original design:


I started working for Iowa Precision back in 1987 as a drafter after my father's adjustable elbow machine company was acquired by them. I helped usher in the use of CAD shortly after that and later wrote the software to replace their mainframe based business management software. 

Sometime around 2007 I was asked if I could take over the control software development for a new machine which I was able to name: The DieMation

This was the project that launched my career in automated control software:



I was then asked to get involved with the controls on their flagship productline and have been writing the control software for new shipments of that product line since 2008. 

Here are some sample videos of projects related to that product line:

Customer Testimonial for Pro-Fabriduct line with partial width inline plasma table:




Residential Ductline:



Compact Ductmaker:




Working remote

One of the challenges when being out on the road at customer installations is finding a good place to work. This is my desk at times which works pretty good. 


These bad boys pay the bills
--both the machine and the laptop--

Operator Training Videos in Production!

We're currently working to create video training content for users of new ductlines. This is an exciting project I've been trying to get traction on for quite some time. I went out to meet a colleague who does video production at a graciously hospitable customer site to get screen recordings and video footage to put together with audio.

My goal is to target short video segments to cover targeted areas of focus and key aspects of the control software that I always ensure new operators understand. These videos will ideally be easy to access, easy to digest, and short enough that people won't feel that they have trouble finding the spot they want to refresh themselves on.

A first draft video showing a technique for aligning fiberglass insulation in an Insulmatic: