Summary: Discover why welding curtains are the answer to your shop’s organizational, safety and budgetary needs.
Warehouses and industrial shops face many challenges when it comes to their floor plans, and it doesn’t always make sense to divide up work spaces permanently. Not only could this cause ventilation challenges, but it can also be a more permanent instalment in a space that very well may need to be re-adjusted as the business grows, or takes on new and challenging projects.
One way to get around this is to install welding curtains.
What is a Welding Curtain?
You may not know them as welding curtains because they have several aliases including curtain walls, industrial curtains and even strip curtains – but regardless of the name, the application is the same.
These curtains don’t block out sunlight, but rather work to divide up industrial spaces without the permanency of walls. Welding curtains can prevent and protect against sparks, ultraviolet light and spatter, reducing the chance of injury to other employees and damage to other product parts.
Welding Curtains – Creating Flexible Work Spaces
When it comes to industrial manufacturing on any scale, contracts come and go, and some projects are bigger than others, requiring much larger spaces to work in. Industrial w
elding shops need the freedom to reconfigure their work spaces, not only to accommodate the parts they may be working on, but also to increase the ease of flow between welding stations and in the shop in general. Welding curtains are great for this because they can easily be moved around or removed entirely when necessary.
You can use welding curtains to reconfigure your workspace as needed, without incurring any additional costs – such as you would if you had walls to move. The ability to adapt so easily and smoothly to any project that comes along is the key.
Save Money with High Quality Welding Curtains
Welding curtains are highly durable and constructed of fire resistant PVC plastic. Not only does what they’re made of make them as cost-effective as they are effective in their job, but it makes them inexpensive to replace if the need ever arises.
Welding curtains from Ancarr are also inexpensive enough to buy in bulk and have extras on hand to accommodate any changes to workspaces that may result in a larger area being sectioned off. It’s always good to have extras on hand anyway, which allows for quick replacements and ongoing safety measures – no waiting for a new order to arrive. You can also replace individual strips if needed, and source customized sizes through us.
Dividing your shop space up with welding curtains is also a good way to control heat dispersal throughout your building. With the right set up you can easily reduce your heating and cooling expenses.
Welding Curtains Allow for Ultimate Versatility
As you may have guessed from the many names welding curtains have, they can be used across a variety of industries. In most cases they are used to partition off a space and separate it or protect it from (or provide protection for) the other areas around it. They can be used as a physical barrier, a sound barrier to some degree, and even isolate odours if installed accordingly.
Aside from their primary purpose of shielding a workspace from incoming or outgoing particles, it’s also a great visual barrier which can help reduce distractions for those working within them.
Safety First – Avoiding Danger
Welding can be a dirty and dangerous profession. The byproduct of welding can be grimy clothes, tools and equipment, but more than that, it can result in serious injuries, including severe burns. Spatter is high temperature metal that can become airborne during the welding process. This can injure anyone it lands on or affect any other equipment or products it may land and cool on.
The person welding wears heavy leather clothing to protect their hands and bodies, as well as a helmet with thick glass to prevent injury to their eyes from starring at the bright light created by the electric arc. Welding curtains are one way to limit how far spatter can travel, and who it can hit.
Welding involves working with many different materials that are prone to spatter– depending on the type of welding you are doing. For example:
- TIG – this uses a non-consumable tungsten electrode to make a weld, sometimes, but not always, with a filler metal. TIG welding is known to use stainless steel as the primary component being joined, and other non-ferrous metals such as aluminum, magnesium or copper alloys.
- MIG – this uses an electric arc, which forms between a consumable wire electrode and the workpiece metal(s), which heats the workpiece metal(s) causing them to melt, and subsequently join together. This is considered to be the most versatile and expedient form of welding, and although it was original designed for welding aluminum, it was later applied to steel and quickly gained popularity. It has also gained popularity because of its applications and adaptation in robotics and automated welding processes.
Some other safety concerns are with air quality. Welders are often exposed to dangerous gases and particles. MIG welding produces smoke containing oxide particles, the size of which determines the amount of danger (smaller is more dangerous). Carbon dioxide and ozone gases are also byproducts of the process and can be deadly if the work area is not properly ventilated. There is an addition fire and explosion risk with the gasses involved, and so extra precautions in that department need to be taken. Welding curtains assist with all of these things in varying degrees, but ventilation is a key component of a safe welding environment and welding curtains do not interfere or prohibit that.
Proper placement of welding curtains is be achieved by taking the overall space into account and the natural airflow of the shop, in conjunction with any ventilation fans or air returns that may be in use.
Invest in your business
At Ancarr, we know that the safety of your employees is as important as the quality of the products you are producing. Welding curtains are a versatile way to promote safety while leaving your shop flexible enough to change and reorganize its floor plan as needed.
If you want a great solution for your shop that is cost effective and easy to install, choose welding curtains by Ancarr. Check out more of our welding products and custom industrial fabric solutions
