A little backround on what a thermocouple welder is will help:
Thermocouples are temperature sensors, commonly used to measure equipment and facility temperatures in (usually) a factory using heavy industrial processes (like a steel mill). Knowing how hot (or cold) things are getting is necessary. Welding the thermocouple to the object being monitored is common practice. Since these sensors can be located anywhere in the factory (like on pipes hanging from the ceiling) having the welder battery powered makes a lot of sense, and is also common in this type of equipment. Unfortunately since this is welding; the batteries are big, heavy, and expensive. The voltages this thermocouple welder operates at can exceed 80V, which makes them high enough to be dangerous, this thing can certainly give you a nasty electrical shock. The semiconductor switch (the SCR mentioned) is probably necessary to help avoid a shock in normal use, but at these current levels (over 1000 Amps) they aren't cheap either. If you were to use a mechanical switch, it would be as big as the switches in a Frankenstein movie.
The CDW isn't battery powered, for its intended applications this would make no sense. It operates at 50V maximum, with the majority of applications operating between 25 and 35 Volts. This keeps it at the safe level, and it has no switch in the high current path. The energy levels are similar to the thermocouple welder; which means that you probably could use the CDW to weld thermocouples, or the thermocouple welder to make anodizing and plating connections.
I didn't see any prices, but I think it would be safe to say that the CDW will be much lower in price than the thermocouple welder, just by comparing feature sets.
I appreciate your patience guys, more details will be provided soon, we are making real good progress.
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