Interchangeable wire drive for wire feeder and spool gun

Abstract

A modular welding wire feed drive for use in a welding system. The welding wire feed drive is designed to be detachably connected to the welding wire feed system of the welding system. The welding wire feed drive includes a drive housing designed to be detachably connectable to the welding wire feed system, a wire contact arrangement designed to controllably feed welding wire through the welding wire feed drive, and a drive motor that is connected to or interconnected to the wire contact arrangement to at least partially drive the wire contact arrangement.

Description

[0001] The present invention is related to the art of welding and more particularly to welders that include the use of wire feeders. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0002] Wire feeders for electric arc welders typically include a welding wire drive assembly that pulls welding wire from a welding wire source (e.g., wire spool, canister of wire, etc.) and then feeds the welding wire to the welding gun. The wire drive assembly typically includes one or more drive wheels that pull and push the welding wire at a desired or controlled wire feed speed so that the proper amount of molten metal is deposited on a workpiece during the formation of a weld bead or the like. [0003] Two general configurations are used to feed welding wire to the welding gun. In one configuration, the wire feeder is connected to or integrated with the welder. In this configuration, the wire feeder includes an integrated motor, drive rollers, gears, and wire guides designed to draw the welding wire from a welding wire s...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0007] The present invention is directed to an interchangeable and/or modular welding wire feed drive for welding wire used in a welding system such as, but not limited to, an electric arc welding system. In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the welding wire feed drive is designed to be a modular-detachable unit. The welding wire feed drive system can be designed to be a) detachably connected to a wire feeder that is integrated in a welding unit, b) detachably connected to a separate wire feeder that is used in conjunction with a welding unit, and/or c) detachably connected to a wire feeder that is on or integrated with a welding gun. As can be appreciated, the welding wire feed drive can be designed to be detachably connected in other and/or additional ways and/or regions of a welding system. The welding wire feed drive is a versatile system that enables a user to configure the wire feeding arrangement of a welding system for a particular operation. When the welding system is to be used with a more rigid welding wire (e.g., carbon steel based wire, stainless steel based wire, titanium wire, nickel based wire, etc.), the welding wire feed drive is typically placed in a wire feeder system that is integrated in and/or is used in conjunction with a welding unit. In this configuration, the

Problems solved by technology

As can be appreciated, a more rigid welding wire can also be used in a spool gun, but such a setup is typi

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