5 min read
Mike Rabasco, CEO of WEBER USA, walks you through the entire process you follow as a customer of WEBER. From your initial reach-out all the way to our stellar after-delivery service, WEBER strives to make the process of automating your screwdriving procedures as pain-free as possible.
Check out this video to learn more or read the video transcript below
The first thing you are going to get is a salesperson into your facility to take a look at what you guys are doing and get a feeling for which one of our products would be best suited for that type of application.
From that point, we really ask for a lot of information. We really enjoy getting models of all parts that we are supposed to be putting together, screw prints, and samples. Prints should have tolerances on them. It's really, really important that we take a look at these jobs very critically from the very beginning so that we are actually quoting the correct solution.
You send all that information through the sales channel and it goes to our inside sales team. First of all, most of them came from the test and build area. So, they are extremely conversant with the equipment already, which helps a lot. One of our engineers works just in the sales department. What he does is he actually models up the exact solution, what it’s going to look like in real life if you were to buy it. He crops our equipment onto your part, and you get a file back from us with our equipment on your part.
You will get a quotation and a lot of times that will be accompanied by a model, a SolidWorks model of our equipment, so you can see what it looks like. You might get some options, like a sound enclosure or robot-rated cables, etc. But, we will advise you what's the best solution for the application. Once we do that, hopefully, you sign off on it, we get a purchase order and then the fun starts!
Project Management Kick-Off Meeting
We have a small meeting with project management and the engineering team and this is kind of an incoming design review. From that point, the project is assigned to a project manager. Our project managers are awesome, and they all also know a lot about the equipment. They tie all this together as it goes through the process here in North Carolina.
Design
From there it goes to the engineering department. The engineering department has to engineer all the little ancillary parts that go along with it. We have already determined the “big lumpy parts” as I like to say, and now we have to actually design the finished product.
Manufacturing and Quality
Whether it's nose pieces, bits, bit adapters, be in compliance with any special needs that the application has. So, an engineer will be assigned to the job and he’ll engineer it.
Build and Test
When he's done with it, we have another meeting and everyone gets together and we say okay, this is what you came up with, and really everyone gets an opportunity to take a look at this to make sure exactly what we are going to start cutting metal on and start making is going to work. It goes to the machine shop, the machine shop makes all the parts that they need, other parts get ordered, and everything goes through the test and build area, our assembly department. They put the equipment together and they test it, and they test it, and they test it exactly the way you are going to use it or as close as we can get with the information that we get from the customer.
Deliver
The reason we do that is because we don't want any surprises when the customer gets it and is using it differently than the way we tested it. Now you get your WEBER screwdriver, you open it up, and you start installing it. You put the screwdriver on the robot, you place the feeder, you run all your cables and that's where we come in again.
Follow-up and Service
We have a service called “Start-Up Assistance” and Start-Up Assistance happens once you have everything mounted and kind of ruffed out. You are starting the robot up, and you got your parts, and you're starting to run screws. That's the day we come in. We send a joining expert in there. These guys are good! They know a lot about automation, they know a lot about processes and that sort of thing. They will look over the equipment, the way it’s installed, the way it's sequenced, the way it's programmed, and they stay with the customer for the first couple of days to make sure everything is right.
This really is a huge value because even though we are making a complete screwdriving system, most of the time we aren't building the rest of the machine. So the Start-Up Assistance really helps tie it together and while we are there we also do training. If there is any kind of maintenance that needs to be done, we take care of that at that point as well.
It really gives the customer kind of a launch pad to get these projects going very quickly with factory support with guys that really, really know a lot. I can’t say enough about Start-Up Assistance, it's really probably one of the best benefits that we offer the customer after they receive a piece of equipment.
WEBER strives to deliver the quality and support our clients have come to expect in today’s highly demanding production environments. Our continued focus on customer experience is evident by offering higher levels of technical expertise, faster deliveries, greater ROI, superior accuracy, and exemplary after-sales support.
We have recently doubled our service staff and invested in additional training to enable a world class and timely response to your needs. WEBER is dedicated to understanding our clients’ challenges and delivering the most suitable technology, product and solutions to see them through today and the next decade.
