A well-known aluminum boat manufacturer and a market leader in its industry, Buster Boats turned to the X8 MIG Welder to bring demanding aluminum welding to new heights with supreme usability and great performance.

Buster Boats are manufactured at the Inha Works located in Ähtäri, Southern Ostrobothnia region of Finland. The boat range varies from four meters to over nine meters, from 2 horsepower up to even 700 horsepower. The key to success at Buster Boats is based on good quality as well as strong product development and R&D. The Inha Works employs about 150 persons, of which 30 are welders.Durability, safety and ease of use were taken as the starting points when designing the new boat range already in 1976. Through the years, almost 125,000 Buster Boats have been manufactured for satisfied boaters around the world. Buster is trusted by both recreational and professional users. Buster Boats was recently sold to Yamaha Motor Europe and the company has a bright future ahead.

Main challenge

“Welding aluminum is quite demanding, and this calls for first-class welding machines. Also, all welders must be trained for the job and their qualifications are regularly controlled. We have daily quality controls and an inspection record is made of each boat,” says foreman of boat manufacturing Kimmo Multaniemi. Even though manual welding cannot be made much faster, Buster Boats highly appreciates usability that also helps to save time: even one minute per boat can lead to 2,000 minutes less production time in one year. Buster Boats has analyzed all products and tasks to the point that the workers know to the minute how much time they can spend for each operation.

Kemppi's solution

Buster Boats was among the first Kemppi partners to test the new X8 MIG Welder – and to bring it into play. The joint R&D with partners is pivotal for Buster Boats. “That benefits both of us,” Multaniemi says. “Our cooperation with Kemppi goes a long way back and this is why we have decided to continue on this path. Kemppi has been a good supplier for us because we have also been able to participate in the R&D of new products. We want to do R&D with Kemppi to have even better machines,” Multaniemi adds. Multaniemi also values the meaning of new innovations for the welders. “I’ve always lived by the philosophy that the easier it is for my welders to work here, the easier it makes my work for me.”

X8 MIG Welder stands for welding comfort with great arc performance, and it’s extremely suitable for challenging aluminum welding. X8 MIG Welder redefines ergonomics in the welder’s most important tool, welding guns: the hand grip, mobility and stability have been optimized to meet the requirements of the most demanding welding tasks.

“The welding gun is really good. It feels better than the previous one,” welder for Buster Boats Kari Urrila comments on his first experiences with the X8 MIG Welder. Urrila has also been impressed about the X8 Wire Feeder. “The wire feeder is really good. It’s placed lower than in the previous models and it’s neater to insert the wire into the feeder.”