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¿Robot o humano?

Welding

Manual MIG welder vs Cobot welding system (welder still loads and supervises)

Estimaciones modeladas por Whirrwork, no hechos. Metodología · Historial de aciertos

Humano · Al año77.986 US$Manual welder
Robot · Al año64.428 US$Buy a cobot welder
Plazo de recuperación42 meses
Año de cruceyaBase-case year (earliest to latest across scenarios)

On these numbers the robot option is clearly cheaper. Payback is longer than three years, which is longer than many robot contracts and some robot companies.

Estados Unidos · USD · BLS OEWS May 2025 national medians by SOC occupation

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Carga de trabajo
Supuesto

Manual welding hours of work per day.

Supuesto

Shift hours per day.

Supuesto

Working days per month.

Supuesto

Months per year.

Personal
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

BLS OEWS May 2025 national median hourly wage, SOC 51-4121.

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

Wages and salaries were 70.0% of total employer compensation cost for private industry workers in June 2026 (ECEC), so total cost = wage / 0.70.

ilostat.ilo.org

Nominal 4.4% a year, 2015-2025 (ILOSTAT hourly earnings).

Supuesto

One manual welding hour.

Robot
Supuesto Hirebotics

Output of one cobot-hour relative to a manual welder-hour. The vendor says most shops see 2-4x; we take the low end.

Hirebotics

Hirebotics Cobot Welder complete system, starting price.

Supuesto THG Automation (integrator)

Fixtures, guarding, training beyond the package. Integrators quote $15,000-$40,000 for un-packaged systems.

THG Automation (integrator)

3-5% of system price per year.

Supuesto

Useful life in years.

Supuesto

Arc-ready share of the shift (loading, tip changes).

Supuesto

Hours lost to faults.

Supuesto

Welds that stay manual: one-offs, awkward joints, repairs.

Supuesto

Welder minutes per robot-hour (fixturing, loading, inspecting). Cobot welding is a person plus a robot.

Supuesto

kWh per hour of welding.

Supuesto

Electricity price per kWh (USD). Check your bill; energy is rarely a big line.

Finanzas
Supuesto

Annual financing / discount rate. Nobody publishes yours; 8% is a round mid-2026 commercial borrowing guess.

Supuesto

Years in the NPV comparison.

Supuesto

Share of a human service price that is labour (rises with wages). Used to escalate and to adjust US service prices to other countries.

Supuesto

Share of a robot service price that is labour (pilot, technician). The rest is equipment, which learning curves make cheaper.

Supuesto

Share of a lease or RaaS fee that pays for hardware (learns down). The rest is service and support (moves with wages).

Download these results (CSV)

Resultados

OpciónAl mesAl añoPer unit (welding hour)Inversión inicialPlazo de recuperaciónBreak-even utilisation5-year NPV vs baseline
Humano Manual welder Referencia 6499 US$77.986 US$36,93 US$— — — —
Robot Buy a cobot welder 5369 US$64.428 US$30,51 US$120.000 US$ 42 meses 27 %
Utilisation 41 %
 61.492 US$

What moves the answer most

Each bar shows the 5-year NPV of the best robot option when one input moves to the low or high end of its range, with the rest held at your values.

5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a cobot welder5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a cobot welderWorkloadlow value: 4 → -24.670 US$high value: 16 → 233.817 US$Work that stays humanlow value: 0.1 → 110.728 US$high value: 0.6 → -12.361 US$Robot output vs a personlow value: 1.2 → 19.146 US$high value: 4 → 93.251 US$Robot purchase pricelow value: 80000 → 84.309 US$high value: 160000 → 11.294 US$Supervisionlow value: 15 → 91.884 US$high value: 50 → 20.969 US$Hourly wagelow value: 20.672 → 26.480 US$high value: 31.008 → 96.504 US$Employer on-cost multiplierlow value: 1.2790000000000001 → 43.117 US$high value: 1.579 → 79.868 US$Financing and discount ratelow value: 0.05 → 77.769 US$high value: 0.12 → 42.483 US$Integration and setuplow value: 5000 → 71.492 US$high value: 40000 → 36.492 US$61.492 US$0low valuehigh valueSource: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/welding/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.

Cost per unit to 2035

Real terms (today's money). Robot hardware follows Wright's law; wages follow each country's history. Shaded band: robots-slow to robots-fast scenarios. Estimaciones modeladas por Whirrwork, no hechos.

ChartCosto humano por unidad (Base), Costo del robot por unidad (Base), Costo del robot por unidad (Robots: avance rápido), Costo del robot por unidad (Robots: avance lento). Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/welding/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.0,00 US$10,00 US$20,00 US$30,00 US$40,00 US$2026202720282029203020312032203320342035USD / welding hourscenario rangeCosto humano por unidad (Base)Costo del robot por unidad (Base)Costo del robot por unidad (Robot…Costo del robot por unidad (Robot…Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/welding/). Modelled estimate, not a f…

Año de cruce: ya

What the spreadsheet misses

Seguridad
Less fume and arc exposure for the welder; fume extraction is still needed.
Calidad
Repeatable beads on repeat parts; fixturing tolerance decides quality.
Flexibilidad
Skilled welders handle the one-offs robots never will.
Edge cases
Poor part fit-up and short runs.
Customer experience
Shorter lead times on repeat orders.
Jobs and redeployment
Welder shortages are the usual reason; welders become programmers and inspectors.
Regulación
Machinery safety rules; welding codes still require qualified procedures.

Relacionado

Fuentes de esta página

Las notas y las fuentes están en inglés; la versión en inglés es la de referencia.

  1. Cobot Welder starting price $105,000 (complete system incl. UR8 Long, power source, torch, cart, software); "most shops see 2-4x the output" Hirebotics, 2026-10 · vendor
  2. Cobot welding price breakdown: integration/commissioning $15,000-$40,000; base system 50-60% of total investment; maintenance 3-5% per year THG Automation (integrator), 2026 · vendor
  3. Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (median hourly wage by occupation) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2025-05
  4. Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026: wages and salaries 70.0% of private-industry compensation (series CMU2020000000000P) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2026-06
  5. Mean nominal hourly earnings of employees by sex and occupation (ISCO-08), DF_EAR_EHRA_SEX_OCU_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), from national labour force and earnings surveys, 2025
  6. Labour cost levels by NACE Rev. 2 activity (lc_lci_lev): Germany 2022-2025, total labour cost vs wages and salaries per hour Eurostat, 2025
  7. Rates and thresholds for employers 2025 to 2026 (employer Class 1 NIC 15% above £5,000) HM Revenue & Customs, 2025-04-06
  8. 令和6年賃金構造基本統計調査 (Basic Survey on Wage Structure 2024), table 1 by occupation Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan (via e-Stat), 2024-06
  9. Average monthly earnings of employees by sex and economic activity, DF_EAR_EMTA_SEX_ECO_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), 2022
  10. Average annual wage of employed persons in urban units in 2024 (by position and by region) National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2025-05-20
  11. Euro foreign exchange reference rates (cross rates to USD), via Frankfurter European Central Bank, 2026-10-23
  12. Wright, T. P. (1936). Factors affecting the cost of airplanes. Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 3(4), 122-128 Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 1936
  13. Nagy, B., Farmer, J. D., Bui, Q. M., & Trancik, J. E. (2013). Statistical basis for predicting technological progress. PLoS ONE, 8(2), e52669 (62 technologies; Wright's law among the best hindcasters; errors grow with horizon) PLoS ONE, 2013