Dire Dawa University

Dire Dawa Institute of technology

School of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering

A Research proposal submitted In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the

Degree of Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering

Title: Design and Fabrication of flexible and multipurpose mechanical

workshop welding table
Proposed by: 1. Abdulaziz Usman (R/0253/08)

2. Dinsefa Fekadu (R/3255/08)

3. Salahadin Getahun (R/0634/08)

4. Tofik Ahmed (R/1099/08)

Advisor: Mr. Habtamu Sewale

Dire Dawa, Ethiopia

January 2021
 Table of Contents
1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 1
1.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Problem Statement ......................................................................................................................... 2
1.3 Objective of the project .................................................................................................................. 2
1.3.1 General Objective ...................................................................................................................... 2
1.3.2 Specific Objective ...................................................................................................................... 2
2. Literature Review............................................................................................................................... 3
3. Methodology ...................................................................................................................................... 4
3.1 Materials ........................................................................................................................................ 4
4. Scope and Limitations........................................................................................................................ 5
5. Expected outcome of the project ........................................................................................................ 5
6. Work Plan .......................................................................................................................................... 5
7. Budget ................................................................................................................................................ 7
Bibliography .................................................................................................................................................. 8

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1. Introduction
1.1 Introduction
The role of welding science and technology is important for the manufacturing industry.
considering most of the production processes in the machinery industry use the joining technique.
The welding process is one of joining technique the metal through local heating to a melting point
with or without pressure and with or without filler metal. The reason for the welding technique is
applied to the manufacturing process because of the lighter structures of construction, welding can
be made with tensile strength approaching or exceeding the parent metal, high reliability and
relatively easy welding process (1).

Welding table is a table which is used to keep the work piece to be welded. It is made of metal of
very high melting point and the top contains of a perpendicular rod system. Some times in small
welding shops there is a problem of positioning and holding of parts to be welded. Welding fixtures
are the solution for these problems. Welding fixtures are available in different size, shapes,
materials and mechanisms based on their need of operations. The precision of the fixture plays a
major role in the manufacturing component. Welding of different geometrical surfaces such as a
curved, angular, rectangular surfaces are very challenging so that positioning is the most important
thing to adjust the components. In mass production, positioning a job takes significant amount of
time due to manual process.

Side by side of welding, Researchers have shown that sheet metal forming has made major and
crucial contributions in many industries especially automotive and transportation companies in
terms of development. The most common metal sheet forming process being the bending process,
also known as metalworking, produces a V shaped (channel or U shape) shape along the axis of a
material by applying a force to a metal sheet causing it to bend into the desired shape. This is done
in ductile materials. Such materials are used in brake presses, pan brakes and specialized machine
processes. Wipe bending needs the sheet to be held against the die by using a pressure pad, causing
the sheet to bend against the radius of the edge. There are two main quality considerations when
doing the sheet metal bending process which include but are not limited to formability and
dimension. Consistency is also mandatory which is minimizing the variations in dimensions which
is a key requirement within mass production (2).

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To overcome this challenge, theoretical approach has been carried out on the fixture like design,
fabrication and analysis. And it is comfortable to combine welding area, sheet metal bender
mechanism, and the same welding fixture for the use of vice, drilling machine, lathe machine as
well as shear cutter in one place.

1.2 Problem Statement

In local welding shops there is a problem of positioning and holding of parts to be welded. So that
geometrical errors would be happened, and this makes their task poor in quality. As well as it
consumes manufacturing time and it will require higher manufacturing cost. So it is necessary to
develop frame welding fixture to reduce cycle time and also it is important to dimensional accuracy
and safety.

Most of local welding shops do not possess sheet metal bender and forced to go to other shop
where this bending machine available. Here is also, they are damaging their manufacturing time
and cost. So, it is necessary again to enhance their working environment ergonomically in order to
maintain their production.

1.3 Objective of the project

1.3.1 General Objective
The general objective of the project is to design and fabricate flexible and multipurpose mechanical
workshop welding table for small welding shops that can be easily manufactured locally with a
minimum cost.

The aim or benefits of the project is: -

➢ To increase the productivity by decreasing operation time.

➢ To reduce man power working in one area.
➢ To facilitate multiple mechanisms in one area.
➢ To facilitate uniform quality in manufacturing (Interchangeability)

➢ Considering the above conditions to maintain cost reduction.

1.3.2 Specific Objective

The specific objective of the project is,

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 ➢ To formulate an idea to suit our required functionality that is flexible and multipurpose
welding table.

➢ To develop the idea to a suitable Mechanical principles and Design.

➢ Perform force, stress, and deflection analysis.
➢ Develop part drawing for each component.
➢ Develop detail drawing of each part for manufacturing purpose.
➢ Develop an assembly drawing of the machine.
➢ Manufacturing of sample product.

2. Literature Review
Fixture is a work holding device that holds, supports and locates the work piece for a specific
operation. The main purpose of a fixture is to locate and, in some cases, hold a work piece during
manufacturing process. A jig differs from a fixture in that it guides the tool to its correct position
in addition to locating and supporting the work piece. Fixtures need to be designed to facilitate the
production of articles in large quantities with high degree of accuracy, uniform quality, and
interchange ability at a competitive cost. The special characteristics particularly suited to the
welding application such as the critical speed of maintain accuracy and part repeatability in an
environment exposed to elevated heat and weld spatter (3).

Welding engineering demands quality that is consistently high coupled with maximum
productivity and so the design of both jigs and high-tech welding fixtures has improved
dramatically over the past 25 years (3). Today, sophisticated modular welding tables, including
those that lift and tilt can be used with a range of innovative jigs and welding fixtures that
ultimately improve quality and consistency of workmanship, and reduce production time, which
in turn reduces costs. Of course, the type of welding fixtures used will depend on what is being
manufactured. So, for instance, if tanks are being constructed, the jigs and fixtures will need to
have the ability to rotate components during the welding process. The equipment used should also
be versatile so that it can be used to manufacture different sized tanks (4).

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3. Methodology
Fixture design consists of a number of distinct activities: fixture planning, fixture layout design,
fixture element design, tool body design, etc. They are listed in Figure 3 in their natural sequence,
although they may be developed in parallel and not necessarily as a series of isolated activities in
actual execution. Fixture design deals with the establishment of the basic fixture concepts:

Fixture layout is an embodiment of the concepts in the form of a spatial configuration of the fixture,
Fixture element design is concerned with the concrete details of the locators, clamps and supports,
and Tool body design produces a structure combining the fixture elements in the desired spatial
relationship with the machine tool.

In the design of a fixture, a definite sequence of design stages is involved. They can be grouped
into three broad stages of design development.

Stage One deals with information gathering and analysis. These include product analysis such as
the study of design specifications, process planning, examining the processing equipment and
considering operator safety and ease of use. In this stage, all the critical dimensions and feasible
datum areas are examined in detail.

Stage Two involves the consideration of clamping and locating schemes. A clamping scheme is
devised in such a way that it will not interfere with the tools or cutters and are fully compatible
with proposed locating surfaces or areas. The locating scheme, using standard elements such as
pins, pads, etc. is designed to be consistent with clamping and tool-guiding arrangements.

Stage Three is the design of the structure of the fixture body frame. This is usually built around
the workpiece as a single element which links all the other elements used for locating, clamping
tool-guiding, etc. into an integral frame work.

3.1 Materials
Fixtures are made from a variety of materials, some of which can be hardened to resist wear. It is
sometimes necessary to use nonferrous metals likes phosphor bronze to reduce wear of the mating
parts or nylon or fiber to prevent damage to the workpiece. Given below are the materials
HSS, OHNS i.e. 20MnCr5 and EN-24, MS which often used in fixture, press tolls, collets etc (5).
The following procedures are used;
➢ Problem identification
➢ Data collection
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 ➢ Simplifications, idealizations.
➢ Define materials/material properties.
➢ Generate finite element model(mesh) or meshing software
4. Scope and Limitations
The scope of this project is to design, develop and manufacturing of the sample product. These
tasks are helped with drawing model of each component. The project will not cover simulations.

5. Expected outcome of the project

Expected outcome of the project are;

➢ Creating good working environment.

➢ Increasing the productivity of welding, improve dimensional accuracy, also safety of
welders.
➢ Ergonomically reached area.

6. Work Plan

Allocation of time for the research is presented below, and we have one and half month of time to
complete the research project.

Time: 1 month and 20 days (January 1, 2021 to February 20, 2021)

Table 1 Detail list of activities

S.No Task Name ( Activity) Duration (weeks)
1. Literature review 5
2. Observation and Data collection 2
3. Model conceptualization 1
4. Concept selection 1
5. Design analysis of each element 3
6. CAD Model 2
7. Design for manufacturing 2
8. Documentation and reporting 4
9. Prototype 6
10. Presentation/ Power point preparation 1

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And the Gantt chart of the above activities is shown below;
JANUARY FEBRUARY
S.No Task name 2021 2021
Week Week
1 2 3 4 1 2
1. Literature review
2. Observation and Data collection
3. Model conceptualization
4. Concept selection
5. Design analysis of each element
6. CAD Model
7. Design for manufacturing
8. Documentation and reporting
9. Prototype fabrication
10. Presentation/ Power point
preparation

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7. Budget
The budget required for this research paper is proposed as shown below:

Table 2 Budget breakdown description

Unit price
S.No Items Quantity Total price
(Birr)

1. RHS (size: 30mm ×30mm, t = 3mm) 1 700 700

2. RHS (size: 40mm ×40mm, t = 3mm) 1 850 850

3. Sheet metal (t = 5mm) 1 1800 1800

4. Flat iron (40mm × 2mm) 1 400 400

5. Angle iron (40mm ×40mm, t = 3mm) 1 600 600

6. Iron rod (diameter = 12mm) 1 600 600

7. Bolt and nut (M10) 15 7 105

8. Screw (M5) 24 3 72

9. Caster wheel (total height= 88mm, wheel 4 350 1400

diameter = 75mm)

10. Spring (int. dia. = 12mm, wire dia. = 3mm) 2 200 400

11. Hinge 2 35 70

Sub Total 6997

Total gross cost of the research is = 6997

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Bibliography
1. Conceptual Design of Modular Fixture for Frame Welding. Tofiq Dwiki Darmawan, Ilham
Priadythama, and Lobes Herdiman. Surakarta 57126, Indonesia: AIP Publishing. 978-0-
7354-1623-9/$30.00, 2018. The 3rd International Conference on Industrial, Mechanical,
Electrical, and Chemical Engineering AIP Conference Proceedings 1931, 030033 (2018);
https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5024092. pp. 030033-1.

2. O. M. Ikumapayi (B) · E. T. Akinlabi · N. Madushele · S. O. Fatoba. A Brief Overview of

Bending Operation in Sheet Metal Forming. S. S. Emamian et al. (eds.), Advances in
`Manufacturing Engineering, Lecture Notes. september 05, 2020, p. 149.

3. Design of welding fixture for sample parts and user manual for Motoman XRC welding robot.
Ashek Elahe,. Mechanical Engineering and Production Technology Bachelor’s thesis2017.

4. [Online] https://www.forsteramerica.com/weldingfixturesandhowtheywork/.

5. Design and Analysis of Welding Fixture for Automotive Component using FEA. C. A.
Kubade, Dr. S.V. Patil and Mr. V. P. Patil. 4, 2016, IJARIIE, Vol. 2. ISSN(O)-2395-4396.

6. A Brief Overview of Bending Operation in Sheet Metal Forming. Fatoba, O. M. Ikumapayi

(B) · E. T. Akinlabi · N. Madushele · S. O.

7. Design of welding fixture for sample parts and user manual for Motoman. Elahe, Ashek.
2017, Mechanical Engineering and Production Technology Bachelor’s.