As a fabrication manager, shop foreman, or CWI, you know the importance of consistency. Errors arising from inconsistent categorization and assignments of requirements can cost your project time and money.
Manual extraction of weld joint data from 3D CAD drawings like Solidworks™ and AutoCAD™ is time-consuming and can lead to errors causing grindouts and rewelds or inefficient use of welding labor.
Welding Drawing Software XML Extraction
While there will always be a need for a professional eye when extracting these 3D CAD drawings, most fabrication managers, shop foremen, and CWIs know that the bulk majority of this work is highly repetitive.
By now, you’re likely using some sort of welding software to handle your projects, whether that be at a supervisory level or for the individual welder on the floor. But as convenient as these solutions can be, they’re oftentimes inflexible. Your company has specific processes and procedures that work for your company. Having a welding software solution shouldn’t force you to abandon the systems that work for you.
As such, your welding software needs to be smart enough to automate the most mundane tasks of a project, while remaining flexible to what your company needs explicitly as per your unique procedures. But, when you use a suite of discrete software solutions for fabrication management, things can quickly get out of hand.
Integrating SOLIDWORKS™, AutoCAD™, DesignCalcs, and Finglow with Your Other Welding Software Solutions
At CEI, we listen to both the welders on the floor and the project managers in the office and try to react to the real-world needs of welding companies. Consistently, fabrication managers, shop foremen, and CWIs alike gave us similar answers: Welding software solution integration (specifically from 3D modeling software to other welding software solutions for fabrication development, design, and bidding) is inconsistent, inconvenient, and costly.
Learn More: Integrating Design & Fabrication Systems with Welding Fabrication Software
How WeldAI Improves your Welding Drawing Software
With WeldAI, the majority of those routine and mundane tasks, like extracting weld joint data from 3D CAD models and XML files, are automated. The remaining subset of tasks may still require critical adjustments and manual intervention. However, automation can take over many routine tasks, leaving your most experienced and critical staff freed up to work on higher-value opportunities. As you continue to use WeldAI, it learns your fabrication habits and adjusts the automations to your work habits.
This means you’ll get a consistent workflow deliverable across all your welding software solutions and your welding processes. Fabrication managers, shop foremen, and CWIs can now focus their attention on those specialized tasks that need their technical skills.
Industry-Specific Welding Software Solution Integration
But how can this work for your company, specifically? No two welding operations are the same. When setting up Fabrication Manager with your welding operations, the team at CEI gets to know your business, your processes, and your team’s unique needs and workflows.
When you implement Fabrication Manager, you’re onboarded by the very software technicians who coded the program which means your software solution is tightly integrated and aligned with the way you do things. The team at CEI brings over 20 years of industry experience to help you apply industry best practices to your welding operations and workflows.
So, what can Fabrication Manager do to help you optimize your workforce and welding processes? The first step to seeing a robust return-on-investment from all your software solutions is to schedule a discovery call. You’ll run us through what you’re using for 3D CAD design and extraction and we’ll show you how Fabrication Manager can help optimize it.
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