SEKI Nut and Bolt Feeders for Projection Welding

SEKI feeders are the fastener feeding standard in North American automotive manufacturing, and G.E. Schmidt is the exclusive North American distributor. The reason they’ve earned that position is straightforward: they work reliably, require minimal intervention, and let production teams focus on the technical demands of the weld cell rather than babysitting the feeder. When your operation runs thousands of weld cycles per shift, a feed system that simply does its job — every cycle, every shift — is worth more than its spec sheet suggests.

The SEKI family covers three main feeding approaches — the Air Rod Feeder, the Feedermate, and the Bolt Feeder — all built around the same core Selector Unit technology.

SEKI Feeder Models

SEKI Air Rod Feeder (ARF)

The Air Rod Feeder uses a pneumatic Jet Pin to place fasteners precisely onto the lower location pin. A controlled pneumatic burst guides the fastener into position — a guided delivery, not a blast-and-hope approach. After placement, the Jet Pin retracts fully before current fires, clearing the weld zone and eliminating any interference with projection collapse during the weld cycle.

SEKI Feedermate (FM)

The Feedermate feeds fasteners to the upper moving head of the welder. For new installations requiring upper-head feeding, G.E. Schmidt now recommends inverting the welder frame — positioning the cylinder on the bottom so the lower electrode becomes the moving element — which allows a standard Air Rod Feeder to feed while the robot repositions the part simultaneously. Contact us to discuss which approach fits your cell configuration.

SEKI Bolt Feeder (BF)

Aligns and sets studs and bolts in the correct weld position. Built on the same Selector Unit platform as the nut feeders, with a feed head configured for bolt geometry.

SEKI SelectMaster

A variation of the Air Rod Feeder with a sensor-equipped selector bowl designed specifically for fasteners that are difficult or impossible to orient reliably with a standard selector gate — including round full-ring projection nuts, which are increasingly common in automotive applications and present significant challenges for both vibratory and standard magnetic feed systems.

The SelectMaster addresses this by feeding fasteners into a track where a sensor reads the orientation of each part. Based on that reading, the fastener either passes through as-is or is diverted to a secondary track where it is rotated 180 degrees before continuing. The result is a feed tube exiting the selector with correctly oriented fasteners on every cycle.

The SEKI Selector Unit

All three main SEKI feeders share the same Selector Unit — the core component that orients and feeds fasteners before they reach the feed head. The Selector Unit uses strong magnets and a fine-tolerance selector gate, driven by a gear-drive motor, to orient and dispatch fasteners without continuous vibration. The high-capacity hopper holds up to 6,000 M6 square nuts and has a compact footprint of 10″ x 19″ x 42″ (W x D x H).

Once the selector gate is set for a given fastener, no tuning is required. The system runs.

SEKI feeders are also compatible with the ProLine Power Hopper — a selector bowl extension with an electronic locking lid and plexiglas viewing window for controlled, visible fastener replenishment.

Why Magnetic Selector vs. Vibratory Bowl

Traditional vibratory bowl feeders rely on continuous vibration to orient and move fasteners. They work, but they require ongoing tuning and adjustment as wear occurs, vibration characteristics shift, or fastener geometry changes. That maintenance burden adds up over the life of a system.

The SEKI Selector Unit eliminates the vibration mechanism entirely. Fewer moving parts means fewer failure points and less operator intervention day-to-day. Vibration-free operation also reduces shop floor noise — a meaningful quality-of-life improvement in high-volume welding environments where multiple cells run simultaneously.

When something does need attention, SEKI spare parts are stocked in the U.S. and ship via air. You’re not waiting on an overseas order to get a cell back up and running — a real operational differentiator compared to systems sourced without domestic parts support.

Why Jet Pin vs. Electromagnetic Pin

Electromagnetic weld pins hold fasteners in position using magnetic attraction. That works for standard carbon steel hardware, but it’s a hard limitation for non-magnetic fasteners — stainless steel nuts and bolts simply won’t hold. The Jet Pin is material-agnostic: it places the fastener with a controlled pneumatic burst regardless of whether the part is ferromagnetic, which makes it far more flexible across different applications and fastener specifications.

The other consideration is weld interference. After placement, the Jet Pin retracts fully before current fires. There’s no pin in the weld zone during the cycle — no heat sink effect, no risk of inconsistent set-down, no interference with projection collapse. The sequence is tightly controlled: feed, place, retract, weld.

Compared to blast-feed or “throw” systems, where the fastener is propelled through the tube and expected to self-orient on landing, the Jet Pin approach is simply more consistent. At high production volumes, even a small misalignment rate from an imprecise delivery system adds up to real downtime and real scrap. Guided placement removes that variable.

Integration with ProLine Welders and NVS+

SEKI feeders integrate directly with ProLine pedestal welders and can be delivered as part of a complete, pre-integrated weld system. For robotic cells where concurrent feeding and part movement are required, the ProLine Adaptive Series Welder can be inverted so the lower electrode moves, allowing a standard SEKI Air Rod Feeder to feed during robot repositioning rather than sequentially — recovering cycle time without a more complex feed system.

For operations running the ProLine NVS+ Advanced Monitor, the ProLine Power Hopper can be controlled via password through the NVS+ interface, adding a layer of accountability to fastener replenishment — access is logged, and wrong-fastener loading is harder to do accidentally.

SEKI feeders are designed for both resistance welding and clinch welding systems.