How to choose the right Cougartron weld cleaner for your production?

Cougartron product news | Weld cleaning | Thursday, 24 January 2019

How to pick the right Cougartron weld cleaner?

Effective treatment and cleaning of metal surfaces after welding requires a great deal of effort.

Regardless of your skill level, using the right equipment plays a huge role in the entire process and can give you a tremendous advantage over the competition.

In addition to increasing the overall quality of your work, the right equipment will minimize your downtime and increase your efficiency. Needless to say, all this greatly contributes to your profitability.

On the other hand, using the wrong equipment increases your risk of losing money, time, and other vital resources.

Designing the production process and finding the equipment for its optimization is a painstaking task.

Therefore, we decided to introduce some of Cougartron’s weld cleaning solutions suitable for various manufacturing situations. This will, hopefully, make your decision-making a bit easier.

So, let’s begin.

Hobby Welding and DIY Projects

Art and craft projects involving welding and other types of metal fabrication share a large number of challenges and similarities with industrial production.

If the metal surface is damaged through cutting and welding, it quickly becomes highly susceptible to atmospheric elements and degradation.

Therefore, it has to be restored and protected against rust and other abnormalities. When it comes to stainless steel, maintaining its attractive appearance is another important factor to consider.

Sculpting, knife making, furniture building, and similar garage projects all require a thorough post-weld procedure as a measure of protection against corrosion and other impurities.

See how Cathal McCarthy – a visual artist from Ireland – uses Cougartron equipment to beautify his stainless steel sculptures after welding here.

Until recently, professional weld cleaning solutions were quite expensive and inaccessible to a wider population. For this reason, many hobbyists resorted (and still do) to dangerous chemicals (commercial and DIY) and messy manual methods such as grinding. We also encountered dangerous experimentation with car batteries to further enhance the effect of these chemicals.

Although these methods can be somewhat effective in removing impurities, they do not guarantee (re)passivation of the surface which is a prerequisite for effective and long-term protection against corrosion.

Considering all the nuances between different types of garage metalworking projects, we can recommend several weld cleaner models to suit your production habits.

•  Cougartron InoxPower:

A perfect machine for occasional treatment of smaller stainless steel TIG welds (3mm or 1/8inch).  InoxPower will provide consistent results and successfully solve all your problems with discoloration and rusting. If you add a couple of useful accessories, the machine can also be upgraded for metal marking which is particularly useful if you want to brand your handcrafts as well.

• Cougartron ProPlus:

Is one of the most advanced solutions you can get for daily cleaning, passivation, metal marking, and polishing of all TIG (up to 10mm or 3/8 inch) welds and smaller MIG welds. 

Low-scale Industrial Production

Metal processing within smaller production environments requires a lot of flexibility. Non-serial production is always challenging due to non-standardized output and a limited number of available resources.

When it comes to post-weld activities, we mostly consider simple and occasional weld cleaning and polishing tasks.

• Cougartron InoxMuscle:

A very lightweight 30amp system is designed to provide fast and effective results on thin stainless steel TIG welds. InoxMuscle is also equipped with a polishing functionality,  which makes it a necessity if weld aesthetics is an important aspect of your work.

• Cougartron ProPlus:

Is recommended, if you need to clean larger TIG welds (over 3mm  – 1/8inch thickness) or smaller MIG ( max 5mm or 1/4 inch) welds on a daily basis. ProPlus is a 50amp powered machine with weld cleaning, electropolishing and metal marking abilities.  See a ProPlus demo video below:

High-volume Industrial Prouduction

Frequent post-weld treatment of larger metal surfaces and structures requires strong equipment that can withstand intense routine and workload. The speed of the process is also an important factor as it directly affects your productivity and the bottom line.

An example of this type of production is the assembly of storage tanks and the construction of steel pipework.

Our Cougartron ProPlus traditionally offers outstanding results in this area. ProPlus is powerful (50amps) enough to clean different grades of stainless steel. It is both effective on TIG (up to 10mm or 3/8inch)  and MIG (up to 5mm or 1/4inch) welds. ProPlus also provides the necessary versatility as it can be used for various types of tasks including weld cleaning, polishing, and metal marking.

In fact, until recently, it was the most powerful weld cleaning system in our range. However, we still had a long way to go before meeting all needs of high-volume industrial production. We needed a machine that would be able to clean all types of welds (TIG, MIG, MAG, Stick, and other) – with improved speed and efficiency. 

The development of Cougartron FURY 200 was the right answer. As the most powerful weld cleaner on the market, it is suitable for the most demanding weld cleaning tasks. Cougartron FURY 200 can utilize three weld cleaning brushes at the same time making it extremely fast and effective when used on large and long welds and surfaces.

• Cougartron FURY 200

Will surely provide an extra boost of efficiency for your production, If you struggle to achieve fast and consistent results when working with thicker and larger metal surfaces. See below for a video comparison of our machines models cleaning 3mm MIG weld. (InoxFURY is the original FURY200 model)

If your job involves only occasional treatment of heavily oxidized welds and surfaces, buying a 200 amp machine may not seem like the best investment.

This is where our new addition to the FURY line – the Cougartron FURY 100 – comes into play.

• Cougartron FURY 100:

The advantages of the FURY 100 machine stand out in two scenarios:

– You do not need the full power (200 amps) of the FURY 200 model

– You still need a high-powered machine for demanding oxide removal for long periods of time on both TIG and MIG welds

FURY 100, therefore, imposes itself as the perfect intermediate solution between the FURY 200 (200amp) and ProPlus (50amp) machines.

Machine Overview

Here is a practical overview of our Cougarton weld cleaning machines:

Book a Cougartron machine demo

If you are not sure which machine model would be best for your needs, or you have decided and want to see the weld cleaner in action, fill out the form below to schedule a free live or online machine demo with one of Cougartron representatives.

We have helped clients around the world to find the right weld cleaning equipment and eliminate common problems associated with inadequate metal finishing methods.