This Gentleman is the Welding Engineer for a well-known Missouri van plant. I have removed his name as the parent corp discourages the public endorsement of a supplier.

During our startup of the full size van in 1995 and 1996 Update Technology was instrumental in our success. Dave Bacon is a master at documenting problems, finding a solution, and distributing - training those same solutions to the skilled trades.

Dave produced over 25 handouts specific to some of our issues here at Wentzville Assembly. In addition to those 25, he also shared past documents he had written to expand our overall knowledge of resistance welding.

We had recently been a Square D Constant Voltage Body Shop and Dave was very good at teaching us the changes in weld controller technology. Our new controls were Medar Constant Current controls. Dave helped us with training on issues ranging from Weld Lobes to Constant Current and C-factor.

In addition to training Dave helped us solve many problems with regards to Sticking Tips, Reducing Expulsion, and Documention.

Thank you Dave.

This Gentleman is the Welding Engineer for a well-known Tennessee auto plant. I have removed his name as the parent corp discourages the public endorsement of a supplier.

Dave Bacon has taught and will be teaching numerous classes in Resistance Welding to our Fab Maintenance trades. Responses from our trades is quite good about the course structure and his knowledge to explain in detail when asked to do so. He has the floor smarts and floor savvy that makes him stand out from all of the rest of the trainers that we have had in the past in regards to resistance welding. His manuals are easy to understand and his graphics have great detail to assist the students during learning curve.

Dave will set down with the plant welding resource to understand the plant practices and documents before the class session so that he has all of the necessary information to provide the students with. He highly emphasises to use the plant practices and the plant welding resources.

In closing, Dave Bacon has what it takes to teach just about anyone about resistance welding.

Tom Mitchell is the Owner and President of ATek Controls. I assisted him with a weld control trial at a Delco plant. The ATek regulates current so well that the reject rate dropped from 50% to zero the day the control was installed, and ran that way ever since! If you want to investigate the value of current regulation, this control is the way to go. Tom is an Ohio State Welding Engineer, nice combination of talent and authority to pursue that talent.

In my opinion, based on our long association, David Bacon is one of only three or four people that I would recommend as a problem solver/trainer in the resistance welding field. I have known David for 10 years and would certainly recommend him to anyone needing assistance with welding problems or in need of training. Feel free to contact me if you need any more info. on Mr. Bacon's qualifications.

Thomas N Mitchell
Owner ATek Corp/Duffers Scientific Corp

Jonald emailed a question to me, and he was very appreciative of my response. He is an Engineer at Mitsubishi Motors in the Philippines. His written English is very good.

When I first e-mailed Mr. Bacon for some Spot Welding Inquiries, I never thought he would reply that quickly. I really appreciate his response regarding my questions since I'm just a neophyte in Welding Maintenance here in Mitsubishi Motors Philippines. Questions regarding preventive maintenance of Spot Welding Gun (kickless/shunt cables, electrodes) and Control Timers were answered by Mr. Bacon...

Engr. Jonald Anore, Mitsubishi Motors, Philippines

I   met Mike Kroman when he was the Corporate Welding Engineer at the Budd Company, a very innovative supplier to the automotive industry. We have worked on some projects together that have changed the way the welding world does things. He also has the commitment to support a product long after the original manufacturer has dropped his support.

Hi Dave,

It would be pretty hard for anyone who has worked with you not to offer a positive testimonial, so here goes…

As someone who has known Dave Bacon and worked with him off and on for over 20 years, it is easy to recommend him to anyone who has resistance welding problems; might have resistance welding problems; wants to know what resistance welding problems look like; or just plain wants to know what makes this brute force process tick. I can think of few engineers in this industry that have been exposed to more welding problems than Dave has in his career. Without question, Dave can supply “what you always wanted to know about resistance welding but were afraid to ask” solutions as well as anyone in the business.

Mike Kroman
President
Magnum Engineering Technologies, Inc.

This comes from Bill Cravello, who asked for some advice on a very difficult welding application. He has sent pictures, drawings, and many explanations, and showed great patience with me trying to understand just what the application was.

Hello Dave,

We've been digesting your recommendations regarding the spot welding fixture; haven't made a firm decision yet.

I will say, though, that I was really surprised to find someone so enthusiastic and responsive to my inquiry - you and I must have had ten or eleven exchanges on the problem. We want to thank you for helping us with this.There's no way we could have properly evaluated something as unusual as the welding fixture we are proposing. But I must warn you: if we have any other problems in the future, we'll be knocking on your door again!

Thanks again, Dave, and good luck in your endeavors.

Bill Cravello, Design Engineer
Southwestern Wire Cloth, Inc.
(918)259-18259
bcravello@midf.com

This is a letter from the Lead Journeyman in the Welding Group, affectionately called the "Wilmington Weld Police". I was sent to Wilmington by the GM Tech Center to find out why SCRs were failing here, and nowhere else.
It turned out that there were a number of unforseen factors causing the SCR to try too hard to make up for the lack of current when sealer prevented current flow. WTC's Akira Nagai (Nadex Corp.) came to the rescue and rewrote the software to limit overcompensation and hold heat within 3% on the first half cycle after penetrating the sealer. This really impressed me, as it is way better than the GM spec of "within 3% on the 3rd cycle". Everyone there was very pleased with the WTC controls.

Just a few words of praise.
Dave Bacon was a great help in the startup of the Inovate Project at the GM Wilmington plant. His expertise was evident in the start up of the Malibu and in troubleshooting the problems with the WTC weld controls that kept blowing breakers and shorting out SCRs. It was a pleasure to work with Dave and his class on welding that I took was both informative but also down to earth and easy to understand. I hope to work with dave again in the future. He will always be welcome at the Wilmington plant.

Richard Howard
Master Journeyman Electrician
Wilmington Weld Group
General Motors Wilmington Plant

This is from a gentleman who thought I might be able to help with a commercial test instrument he was designing. This had to be treated in a confidential manner because it was going for a patent application right after completion. The circuit had some clever and unusual features that should have worked, but did not because of interaction between the power section and the measurement section. The great thing about Maxim is that he was willing to implement every experiment I requested, even though some sounded very useless, like parallel wires between the same points.

I "met" David Bacon by tripping over some of his writing on the Web and then e-mailing him.

I was having a devilish problem with a circuit that worked on paper, but misbehaved in real life. The EE who had designed the circuit was frustrated trying to troubleshoot it, and I was pushing up against a deadline to get it working. So as I said, I did a search, tripped over an answer David had written to someone else, and thought maybe he might have an insight.

What resulted was a flurry of e-mails back and forth where I was sending circuit diagrams and describing test results while he was cogitating on the results and analyzing things long distance. I wouldn't suggest everybody do this, but we wound up corresponding into the wee hours of the night. Two things stand out in my mind, first was that he never tried to put me off by saying I was nuts to be trying to do what I was doing (which a long list of other EEs had done) and second that he applied such a firm, reflective attitude to the task. It was as if he was willing to rotate a map over and over until he recognized North was at the top and then suggested directions to my goal, while others had tried for a bit, given up and then said "Well, there's no use going there anyway."

I suppose the important thing is that after several suggestions which didn't solve my problem (especially when you add in my mis-wiring and then re-wiring things a few times), eventually he made a suggestion which, while deceptively simple, did the trick. What a wonderful feeling to be freed from the salt mines of troubleshooting a "simple little circuit".

So the bottom line is that, although I have never met David in person, I can testify that he is a fellow who you can never appear too dumb to, who is willing to examine "simple" things and explain what is going on, and to listen (and respond to) questions from the "dumb" to the complex, and remain friendly to boot. Exactly the sort of person who makes both a good helper and teacher.

And he truly saved my bacon.

Maxim Hurwicz

From Gregg Fitzgerald, a Technical Trainer and good guy at Ford Kentucky Truck Plant. This was written to an associate of his in another Ford facility.

Al,

I was doing some research on resistance welding just trying to better educate myself. I ran across this website http://www.updatetechnology.com/. It has some good welding info on it and an online test that I recommend highly. Have some of your TEGs and weld engineers take it, see what they know. To make a long story short. We decided to have it's author David Bacon come here to KTP and put on his welding class to our Resistance welding instructors as a continuous improvement 3T.

It was a great class. David is truly an expert in resistance welding. He draws from extensive experience and hands on application and clearly has a passion for the subject. He took us to a higher level. He is also a good instructor and keeps the class interesting. I believe a good technical instructor must be able to put a complicated subject into understandable terms. David did that with analogies, real world examples, diagrams and even facts, figures and calculations where absolutely necessary.

Give me a call some time and I will fill in more details.

Gregg Fitzgerald
KTP Technical Training