Plans for a real cone rolling machine

I cant imagine you will find any published plans for this. Although a few US manufacturers made machines like this before the first world war, my guess is that the total world market for machines like this is below a couple of hundred a year. In other words, tiny. Just finding one in the flesh to copy is going to be quite difficult. I have seen a lot of sheet metal equipment, and I have never seen one of these outside of a woodcut in a 80 year old catalog. Pexto made one right around 1900, but not since, as far as I know.

Plans of any sort for sheet metalworking machines tend to be for very simple, very low quality, light gage and simple machines. Like Gingery plans for slip rolls, which, frankly, are of much lower quality and usefulness than your average chinese import. The only reason to build these machines is cost. And generally, anyone who has the tools and equipment to do it right can make more money at their real job than they would save making one themselves. No manufacturer, even if patents have expired, likes plans out there of a machine they sell, so they dont make it easy, and often will send cease and desist letters even if they arent 100% legally correct.

All that said, I would copy the design of a rotary machine, like a Roper Whitney 622

Frankly, I would just buy a chinese or taiwanese rotary machine, as the casting, gears, and adjustment mechanisms on a $500 Jet or Grizzly are better than I could make for that amount. Then, I would lathe turn the cone shaped rolls. Without a real machine to study and copy, there will inevitably be some fine tuning of the third roll adjustment mechanism. Rotary machines only have two rolls, but one is adjustable for height. Two driven rolls ought to do it, for thin sheet.

looks to me like the cone rolls are mounted at an angle to bring their points together? how small of a cones are you rolling ?

looks like a good project.

Often, eh? On what basis does such a firm make demands agin someone for publishing mere facts?

What possible claim can be made against publishing facts?

On Mon, 17 Dec 2007 23:31:57 -0600, with neither quill nor qualm, Richard J Kinch quickly quoth:

That's not the point. The point is that if they choose to spend the money, they can sic a speaking weasel on you for nothing at all. Far too many frivolous lawsuits still get past the gatekeepers. That's only one of the ways our legal system is broken.

-- Seen on a bumper sticker: ARM THE HOMELESS

I lost a good job when the company was bought and the competition sued, claiming that it was Unfair that the largest ATE company had bought the one with the best technology. They lost, but the defense tied up senior engineering long enough that we lost market timing.

At another place I had to defend myself for using the "trade secret" thermistor liquid level sensing technique that I had actually seen in the Low Fuel warning light on my car.

Considering the number of homeless who are murdered each year, its not a bad idea.

Disney, Microsoft, and other big companies throw their weight around, legally or illegally, all the time. Currently, the Red Hot Chili Peppers are suing Showtime over the term "Californication" claiming that since they titled their 1999 album by that name, they somehow own the word. I am sure I saw bumper stickers as early as the 70's saying "Dont Californicate Washington" up here in Washington State, but whoever can pay the most lawyers wins in the end.

All that is a sideshow, however.

The more interesting question is-

Are there ANY plans available for building decent, commercial quality sheet metal equipment? Forget things as complicated and obscure as this cone roller- I have never seen a reasonable plan for something as simple as a slip roll or a finger brake.

I purchased the Gingery book on building your own brake- its a joke. Where I live, minimum wage is $7.75 an hour- and I could work at McDonalds, and make the money to buy a chinese import that would be 3 times the machine faster than I could build the silly Gingery brake. It is designed, not to do the job, but to resemble a brake, made from the cheapest materials in the easiest way.

There are a couple plans for Hossfeld knockoffs on the dropbox, but they tend to ignore the features that make a hossfeld actually work, and they are usually not compatible with Hossfeld dies, which seems kinda silly.

I have seen a couple of plans for fixed, not slip, rollers, that are very limited in size and capacity, and would again be more work than just buying one from Grizzly.

The only "plans" on the internet I have ever found that were actually worth using, were the CADPLANS for front end loaders for a tractor. And they are far from free- I think I paid $150 for them. But when I built the loader, it did everything it said it would, and 7 or 8 years later, its still working away on my little Yanmar Diesel tractor. And even buying new hydraulics, it cost about a third of a retail priced new one.

But tools, especially sheet metal tools? Who would draw such plans? Why would they do it? If they had the skill to design a brake, or a set of rolls, that did not infringe on any existing patents, that worked well, and was salable, why the heck wouldnt they just sell the tool, at a much higher profit margin? The CadPlans guy does not get rich selling his plans for $150, and yet everybody complains. To actually do decent plans for a finger brake, you would need to build a few- make sure they work right, figure out true capacity, etc. And to do it right, you would need a decent machine shop, and probably send out castings. Suddenly, you are talking real money.

Sure, there are plans for model steam engines and trains- but these are the hobbies of wealthy retired guys. And even then, most of them require a decent machine shop. If you have the money, and the skills, to acquire a machine shop, chances are you will just buy a brake from Grizzly if you need one.

This cone roller is a bit different though- as far as I know, there are only a couple of manufacturers in the world, and they get the high prices for em- 1600 pounds is almost 3 grand US. I think the italians may also make one, similarly priced. Its a very small market, and they can get away asking these prices. But because its a small market, there would be no market for plans- how many could you sell? a dozen sets?

If you really need a machine like this, building one might be feasible- but it would not be easy or cheap.

Another thing to consider is that the original poster is in the Netherlands- where cheap tools are much harder to come by- here in the USA, there are often deals to be found on old sheet metal equipment, but in northern europe, they are rare and usually pretty expensive. And there are far fewer cheap chinese imports available- Here, I would start with a Jet or Grizzly rotary machine, for $500 or so, and turn my own cones, and start from there- but in Europe, I dont know how available, or cheap, the chinese sheet metal equipment is.

None of this answers his question, of course. I would love to know of a source for good plans- but I really doubt it exists. Somebody prove me wrong.

Unfortunately..if we did, the suicide rate would spike a peak that would reach to the moon.

Which wouldnt be all that bad...shrug. Not having to dodge piles of human feces when parked in alleys behind machine shops would be nice...

Gunner