When the average person opens up a refrigerator and grabs a too-warm soda can or bottle, his initial reaction is one of disappointment. But, if that person is an assembler of harnesses for this type of appliance, his initial thought is: Check the evaporator fan wiring harness.

On construction jobsites throughout the world, contractors rely on the spirit level to make sure surfaces are truly flat (horizontal) or plumb (vertical). This type of level—so named because it contains a vial of alcohol (spirit) with a bubble in it—has been used for centuries and remains very popular.

Plastics and polymer composites are essential to a wide range of safety and performance parts in cars today. In fact, the use of plastic and polymer composites in light vehicles has increased from less than 20 pounds per vehicle in 1960 to 334 pounds per car in 2015.

When one thinks of Italy, several things immediately come to mind. There’s wine and pasta, world-class soccer and gondoliers singing in Venice. Another thing that symbolizes Italy is Maserati, the manufacturer of technologically advanced sports cars.

Lightweighting is the No. 1 challenge facing automotive engineers today. Manufacturers are scrambling to build vehicles that contain a variety of weight-saving materials, such as aluminum, carbon-fiber composites, high-strength steel, magnesium and plastic.

At a recent Fabtech convention, many visitors to our booth told us the same thing: “We’d really like a large fan in our facility, but we can’t—we weld.”

In 1998, the odelo Group developed and began production of the world’s first full-LED rear light for automobiles. Although noteworthy, this achievement is but one of many for the company, which has manufactured rear and tail lights for all German premium-vehicle OEMs since 1935.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a bacterium responsible for many hard-to-treat and life-threatening infections, including pneumonia and blood poisoning. MRSA is especially troublesome in hospitals, prisons and nursing homes, where patients with open wounds, invasive devices and weakened immune systems are at greater risk of infection.

The need to reduce vehicle weight has spawned myriad new technologies for assembling aluminum, high-strength steel and other materials. These new technologies include self-piercing rivets, flow-drilling screws and friction-stir spot welding.

For more than 30 years, manufacturers have used infrared welding (IW) to assemble plastic components that are large, made of challenging materials or have high strength and hermetic requirements.