Ok... there are obviously sheet metal brakes out there to do this, but the price gets up there pretty quickly. I was wondering if it would be practical bend some small pieces of aluminum in my hydraulic press by positioning them between a couple pieces of steel angle iron or perhaps making some "special" angle with a sharp inner corner or rounded outer corner to better match the two pieces and get a more uniform bend. Not a lot of work this way. Just some simple one off stuff.
The second part of my wondering, and hence the cross post, is would this result in to much contamination of the aluminum for good quality welding?
This is called a press brake, and is quite common.
If the surfaces of the angle are clean and smooth, it shouldn't be any problem. Of course, only certain alloys weld well. Don't try to bend 2024, either, without annealing first, or it just breaks.
This is the way most high-volume bending is done in production -- albeit with fancier tools. The female tool is usually positioned with the angle at the bottom, making a V-shape as you look at it from the side of the press. The male tool -- the mating V -- is positioned on the ram.
Unless you reinforce the angles they will bow and the bend in the aluminum will be uneven.
For a few thin pieces a better way is to screw one angle to the edge of a heavy plank and clamp the aluminum against it with another angle, then make the bend with a rubber hammer.
The Miller welding site has a list of simple projects with plans and a sheet metal break is one of them....
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Sure, that would work. As the other poster said, that type of configuration is the standard way it's done in industry. But of course, the dies are custom made tooling with a female tool steel V block at the bottom and a mail V block in the top.
Here's an example of a typical Hydraulic Press Break...
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As the other poster said, if you just use angle iron alone it might not be strong enough. You might have to reinforce it one way or another to keep it from bowing. It's just a function of how much force it takes to bend the aluminum and how large and strong of an angle you use. I'd just experiment and adjust as needed to make it work. If you have a press strong enough to do it, it sounds like a good way to do it.
Shouldn't be an issue. As the other person said, make the steel surfaces smooth and clean and the contamination should be minimal. Just clean the aluminum (as is always advised) before welding.
The clamp and hammer solution as suggested by the other poster is also dead simple and very effective. I just did that this morning to make an aluminum bracket to attach a tall cabinet to the wall. Creating dies for your press will probably produce better bends but will take you a bit more time and effort and experimenting to get it working correctly.
Interesting stuff. I actually have a hydraulic press. Don't think I'ld have the strength to much bennding with a manual press. A few weeks ago I wanted to due some stuff, and found the seals where bad on the jack in mine, so I replaced it with an air operated one. Whoooooeeee! Now that some cool sh, er, stuff. I used it to straighten a shaft on something. Roll, mark, bend, roll, mark, bend. And talk about fast. I wish I'ld ponied up for an air operated jack a long time ago. I then figured out an easy way to gget the jeck in and out so I can use it for other stuff. I just extend it, put in two blocks, and then release pressure. Takes about ten seconds to take the jack out so I can use it for things like lifting trailers and trucks. Now, I'm thinking about getting a longer air operated ram for my cherry picker too. Work is kinda fun when you have cool tools to do it with.
I don't know about the contamination, but I doubt if it would be problem. I'd say that more alumimum is going to rub off on the steel of the dies that the other way around.
Pete Stanaitis
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Bob La L> Ok... there are obviously sheet metal brakes out there to do this, but
I have a lot of aluminum to bend so I made some hinges to join the angle and channel stock I had been hammering on. The grey color is epoxy paint to protect the finish on the siding. The hinges are on short bolt-on sections, allowing the brake to be shortened for heavier stock.
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I showed it to a neighbor who then told me he had a Tapco siding brake I could borrow.
It's goes to a 4 dimensional gun drill for boring worm holes.
Or, it's a lamp filament before the steel mandrel gets dissolved out. One of the more offbeat things I work on is designing tooling for winding unusual filaments. That one's a straightforward shape, unusual only because it's for a high watt, low voltage lamp. I think the pic is there to demonstrate what sort of photos can be taken with a cheap digital camera and a stereo microscope.
On Wed, 16 Jul 2008 22:34:36 -0400, with neither quill nor qualm, Ned Simmons quickly quoth:
I like it!
Soooo, what kind of tooling will make that kind of winding, Ned? Those must be expensive lamps to warrant the extra steps of dissolving the steel core, neutralizing the acid, etc.
Cool. What's the actual size?
I like offbeat work like that. I've recently put up a teepee for one client and bid on repairing a broken casket for another.
The first coiling on the mandrel is made by the spool by a machine like this.
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There are any number of ways to make the second coiling. High volume filaments are made on dedicated high speed machines. Heavy low volume coils like that in the pic are often made on spring winders, which are general purpose wire forming machines. In addition to making plain coils, they can be tooled to form all sorts of ends on the coil.
All coiled-coil filaments, even a $.50 standard 60W bulb, are made on mandrels. The steel is dissolved out in hot HCl. But you're right, the neutralizing and washing is critical.
The small wire is about .005, the overall diameter is about 1/8".
I lived in a teepee for a while, erecting one properly isn't easy. I turned down some work at a large casket manufacturer several years ago. Besides the fact that it was farther away than I prefer, building furniture to be buried rubbed me the wrong way.
I want something far more practical if I go and there is any chance they might want to take another look later.
I wonder if Preformed Line Products could be persuaded to build caskets like their Armadillo splice cases - deep-drawn stainless steel shell and a vulcanized rubber lining, bolted together with Stainless bolts and nuts, and pressure tested for leaks before burial.
On Thu, 17 Jul 2008 23:52:02 -0400, with neither quill nor qualm, Ned Simmons quickly quoth:
That was a fun one to get to resolve on a browser.
Do they make long coils on these and then cut to length and uncurl to form? And to put it on a core, is it wound externally or pushed on from one end, or what? I guess I was expecting to see some type of fancy rotor winding machine for that purpose.
Yeah, before heating them to white hot temps.
That's a wee bit smaller than the 5/8" ACME rod I thought it was.
True. I'd much prefer a yurt, myself.
Och! Our pride is a funny thing, isn't it? I've never understood the need to be buried and then fawned over, especially in a fancy and very expensive casket. What a waste of time and money! Burn me and feed my ashes to the fishies (figuratively speaking), thanks.
On Fri, 18 Jul 2008 00:18:20 -0700, with neither quill nor qualm, Bruce L. Bergman quickly quoth:
I can see the advertisements now: "Our finest mass-produced caskets, ready to keep your recently deceased relative's body safe from the worms for eons! Now in metallic paisley, religious red, basic black, vulture violet, blasphemous blue, and Fonda yellow"
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