Aquamarine General Manager Craig Bollinger beside the new H5-200 model aquatic harvester on a TC-14K-2 trailer conveyor.
For over 40 years, Aquamarine of Oakville, Ont., has been building a line of aquatic plant and weed harvesting equipment for customers around the world. Because each build was a custom design, keeping up with orders was a serious challenge. For that reason, in the past few years the company decided to streamline its product line to standardized models. The move has kept the company busy and efficient, while lowering the cost of production.
Aquatic plant harvesting and trash collection is a niche market segment, as you can imagine. Aquamarine General Manager Craig Bollinger said that he has seen pictures from the late 1800s of wooden versions of modern day harvesters that look not unlike the product Aquamarine makes today. As he noted, “It’s like comparing the first automobile to today’s cars – night and day.”
Bollinger’s father purchased Altosar, a Brampton, Ont.-based company, 42 years ago. When the Aquamarine Corporation, the No. 1 name in the industry, went into receivership in Wisconsin, he purchased the corporate assets and bundled the two businesses together.
Over the years customers have requested any number of additions to bolster the capabilities of their aquatic harvesters.
Bollinger explained that, “Because the specifications requested by each customer were so specialized, it was almost as if every machine that came off the line was a custom piece of equipment.”
When he sat down with his team to determine how they could streamline production, they found that it was possible to make an even more appealing product that could also be less expensive.
“We modernized two of our models that are now certified under Transport Canada’s guidelines, which is important for our customers because it is an internationally recognized marine body. The H5-200 model is the largest sized harvester that can still fit into a standard 40-ft. sea container. The second model is our larger H9-905. More than half of our sales are to customers who purchase two to five H5-200s instead of one H9-905. H5-200s are much more cost effective once you take into consideration shipping costs, launching and towing weight issues, versatility and accessibility benefits.”
The pictures here show the new H5-200 model on a TC-14K-2 trailer conveyor. The harvester now has a stainless steel hull as standard. Its paddle wheels function in both the side and rear positions, which provides for better access in narrow places and faster travel speeds, as this effectively increases the overall water line length of the vessel. Rear positioning also keeps the paddle wheels out of the debris field when collecting trash. A new electronic system designed and built in-house, complete with tethered remote controls supplied by Hetronic Canada, allow for increased safety and operator comfort.
The head sits at the front of the harvester, collecting weeds and refuse, and then conveying it up and onto the harvester’s main conveyor, below a control bridge on which the operator sits.
The use of a laser cutting machine has simplified assembly and allowed the Aquamarine team to improve the design of its harvesters. "Having Soldworks and a TRUMPF laser makes it possible for us to model and laser cut the main support beam for the control bridge of our H5-200, with over 200 cutouts," said Bollinger.
In addition, users can select from available options, including a diesel engine, a sun/rain bimini cover, an operator cab, a skimmer package, a wash down water pump, a toolbox, and an automatic oil lubrication system.
The move to standardized equipment was made for profitability’s sake. “We wanted to do a better job, we wanted to build safer equipment, and we wanted to improve profitability,” Bollinger said.
What has allowed these improvements to take place is how technology has changed over the past decade or so, and the impact that it has had on the Aquamarine production environment.
For instance, several years ago Aquamarine purchased a TRUMPF CO2 flatbed laser cutting machine. The accuracy of the cuts capable on a laser, in combination with SolidWorks design program, has reduced production time because parts can be designed and cut more precisely.
“Every weldment now comes off welding jigs and fixtures,” said Bollinger. “There isn’t a single weldment or assembly that isn’t performed on a fixture, which is what now allows us to build components separate to machines. It used to be that we’d build everything, assemble to ensure fit, disassemble for painting, and then re-assemble the components for final assembly. For this reason, up until three years ago, you would see very little inventory in our shop. But now with the accuracy of the laser, and our welding fixtures, that’s a thing of the past.”
Having the laser has also allowed the company to add design details to parts of the harvesters that would have been difficult to achieve with other cutting methods. For instance, on the paddle wheels, drainage of water from the wheel wells is made easier because of the precise cuts made on the laser, so there is little opportunity for water to be trapped and prematurely wear the paint surface.
Aquamarine has designed and built its fixtures so that welders can position the weldments themselves. They use cranes as necessary so that welders can weld in the down position where possible. “It means our welders can work more safely and productively, while achieving better quality welds,” explained Bollinger.
Now, all finished carbon steel parts are sent out for powder coating to Automatic Coating Limited (ACL) in Scarborough, Ont. With the new design, Aquamarine upgraded from a wet spray to a dual-component epoxy-polyester powder coating system.
“Weldments and parts are blasted, primed with epoxy, and then top-coated with polyester,” Bollinger described. “The polyester paint helps to protect UV rays from fading the paint colour.”
“Every weldment now comes off welding jigs and fixtures,” said Bollinger. “There isn’t a single weldment or assembly that isn’t performed on a fixture, which is what now allows us to build components separate to machines.”
The switch to stainless steel hulls as a standard material to improve longevity and provide increased toughness is also based on technological changes in the industry. “It used to be that we would only sell stainless steel as an upgrade,” said Bollinger. “Stainless steel is more difficult to cut, to bend, and to weld, unless you have the proper equipment.”
For welding stainless steel, Aquamarine purchased a Fronius TPS/I welding system. It is a multi-process machine. As long as the required hardware capabilities are included in the base model, select processes can be upgraded through a software update. For example, the machine can have the functionality of a pulsed-arc power source added to it with a software upgrade via USB or unlock code. This is what Aquamarine uses.
With its Pulse Multi Control (PMC) process, which is part of the TPS/i power source, Fronius provides welders with a tool for improving pulse welding. The two multi-control features of the PMC process are the arc penetration stabilizer and the arc length stabilizer. Used together, they ensure that amperage remains constant at the welding arc, regardless of stick out changes. The penetration stabilizer will vary wire feed speed to maintain a constant amperage at the arc, translating into consistent penetration results.
The arc length stabilizer is an induced short circuit in the pulsed waveform. It takes readings so that adjustments to wire feed speed can be made accurately and the penetration profiles can be improved. The arc length stabilizer ensures there will be minimal changes in arc characteristics throughout different welding positions.
“This was the best technology I could find without going to a laser welding machine, which would be impractical for the work we do,” said Bollinger. “So we had to choose between going with a standard TIG machine and the Fronius. And for us, the Fronius is like having a CNC welding machine. Instead of designing paths and your CNC performing the motion, it kind of reverses that process: You perform the motion and it performs all the changes required on the job in real time. It’s basically changing its wire feed speeds multiple times a second to maintain weld consistency.
“As you move your gun farther from or closer to the material, it reacts,” he continued. “For instance, as the operator changes his stick out (contact tip to work distance) the machine will recognize this change and ensure a quality weld is deposited. Our best welder didn’t like it at first because it was so different from what he was used to. It’s like TIG welding with a CNC MIG gun. After two weeks, that same welder didn’t want to use anything else.”
Programming was the biggest adjustment, compared to previous welding systems the team had used.
“It took a while to get all the programming in place for the variety of fit-ups of different gauges,” explained Bollinger. “It’s a machine we generally use for light-gauge applications, but there are heavier weldments that weld onto reinforced sections. We had to develop our programs to deal with 14 gauge to 14 gauge, 14 to 11, and quarter inch to 14 gauge. Now we run those programs and it’s faster, there is significantly less cleanup, less heat input, and therefore less distortion. We use less filler materials as well, and end up with better welds.”
Welding the stainless steel hull has been made easier with the introduction of Fronius welding technology.
Once parts are welded on Aquamarine’s jigs and fixtures, they are shipped in traveler bins that go to and from the paint shop. The bins also serve as inventory and assembly bins.
“The part will live its whole life in the bin and will be kept off the shop floor,” said Bollinger. “When customers come into the shop, we want them to be able to see our inventory of parts and weldments as well as the machines that are being assembled.”
Aquamarine began this process change about five years ago and they now produce 2.5 times the number of parts with the same amount of labour. Man-hours per machine has been reduced by 60 per cent.
“We used to spend more on direct labour than what we sell the machines for today,” said Bollinger. The base price for an H5-200 harvester is now down to US$49,900, where it has remained for five years.
There is more to these machines than just the metalwork, of course, but Aquamarine has simplified each of these systems as well so that essentially everything on it is a kit produced by a well-respected, internationally recognized supplier: Kubota engines, Danfoss hydraulics, Hetronic controls, and Lincoln Lube lubrication systems, to name a few.
“We re-designed our line of equipment with our suppliers,” Bollinger explained. “For example, we used to make all of our own hydraulic hose assemblies here at Aquamarine. Now our supplier Omniflex Hose & Equipment Ltd. in Cambridge, Ont., supplies hydraulically certified hose assemblies to us in kit form so if, somewhere in the world, a client pops a hose, we can send them a replacement part just as easily as a complete kit.”
That, and the safety improvements resulting from having the harvester built to Transport Canada standards, creates yet more interest for Aquamarine products in the marketplace. Aquamarine is now at the stage where they are keeping up with orders and beginning to accumulate some finished inventory. With sales growing every year it is a good news story for the Aquamarine team.
Editor Robert Colman can be reached at rcolman@canadianfabweld.com.
Aquamarine, 905-825-1371, www.aquamarine.ca
Fronius Canada, 905-288-2100, www.fronius.ca
Toronto, M1R 0A1 Canada
See More by Rob Colman
Robert Colman has worked as a writer and editor for 20 years, covering the needs of a variety of trades. He has been dedicated to the metalworking industry for the past seven years, serving as editor for Metalworking Production & Purchasing (MP&P) and, since January 2016, the editor of Canadian Fabricating & Welding. He graduated with a B.A. degree from McGill University and a Master’s degree from UBC.
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