News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Tennessee Tech’s College of Engineering has a new 480-volt laser welder to help the program provide better training to engineering students.
The welder is valued at around $350,000, a donation from ATC Automation and Robotics in Cookeville. College of Engineering Dean Joseph Slater said the welder will be used in a variety of classes for training and research purposes. Slater said the welder will help the university keep up with the manufacturing industry.
“Many of these methods have existed for quite some time,” Slater said. “But they are becoming commonplace in the industry and our students need to be using these current technologies that are in the industry and so this gift from ATC is going to allow us to make sure our students are ready for the workforce.”
Slater said the manufacturing industry is using laser welders as they can be more precise and reduce production times. Slater said Engineering programs are very expensive to keep as the need for equipment is always changing and always expensive.
“Engineering very specifically has equipment needs for education that make it much more expensive than say a history degree or a sociology degree because we have these very expensive modern pieces of equipment, so it’s essential that we get these through grants and donations so we can better educate our students.”
Slater said he believes the university received the welder as ATC has made many compliments about how they value Tech graduates.
“Our graduates have a reputation of being ready to roll up their sleeves and get working from day one,” Slater said. “Many of the people that work at ATC as engineers are graduates from our programs.”
Slater said building upon the programs with equipment like the welder only helps the university attract more students in the future.
