Weldbot LLM
No doubt there are other welding companies that have invested in artificial intelligence to various degrees. Lincoln Electric, for example, offers the Lincoln Weld Sequencer for around $3,800/year license; which might be considered AI, but is maybe better considered an advanced procedural sequencer. To date, I suspect there are no welding shops that have taken an AI-first approach, and built their entire operations up from scratch using AI, specifically with Large Language Models. Consider Industrial Kintsugi to be among the first of a new generation of AI-first welding operations.
In my opinion, it all starts with the welder. For our operations, we wanted to focus on bespoke projects, artist and scientific prototyping. We’re not a manufacturer of mass parts. Not yet, anyhow. Rather, we want versatility, and the ability to work with as wide a range of materials as possible… stainless steel, aluminum, bronze, gold, silver, titanium, cast iron… our goal was originally to have a welder that could be used for any hobby projects on the farm. But to get that kind of versatility, you need knobs. Lots of them. Which is why we went with the PrimeWeld 225 TIG welder. A beautiful piece of equipment, designed to be able to weld just about any type of metal.
However, that versatility comes with a need to adjust arc parameters, and that requires knobs. Lots and lots of knobs. All one “has to do” is dial in the right recipe. Which is why I setup up a Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) pipeline using a large language model, and dumped in all the control settings and a bunch of welding and metallurgy reference manuals into the pipeline. Now…. instead of paying $3,800/yr and a $5000 base machine, we’re in the game at a fraction of the expense of our competitors.
And mind you, having set up LLM pipelines with the Federal AI sandbox; I’ve set this RAG pipeline up in a way that I have a path for integrating with our other software I’m writing for process workflow and quality assurance inspections. Yes, our competitors are large and already well capitalized and have carved out large markets already. But as a scrappy garage startup, we have the luxury of setting up our operations from the beginning with the latest processes and know-how, and to focus our business in the areas that the large competitors aren’t. Versatility and bespoke is the name of the game.
