Sheet Metal Cone Software

Hello, surftom! You wrote on 24 Nov 2003 07:22:41 -0800:

s> Recently had to make a sheetmetal cone..... s>

Thx for this wonderful post!

With best regards, ahlbebuck. E-mail: snipped-for-privacy@saftour.co.zar

Yes, it's a nice program. Also, if you don't have a slip roller to roll up your cone, set the resolution down to something like 16-36 in the preferences window. That makes it draw visibly straight lines instead of smooth arcs on the ends. Now tape the paper down to your sheetmetal, set your brake to the angle corresponding to the resolution you chose (resolution of 8 needs 3 bends of 90 degrees each; don't ask me to explain his math :-)) and make a bend on the line connecting the ends of each line segment at the top and bottom of the cone. You get your cone with lots of flat sides, but at least the angles are all the same and to me it's still better than trying to roll it around a random piece of pipe :-). The more patience you have the more subdivisions you can use and the smoother the result.

-- Regards, Carl Ijames snipped-for-privacy@verizon.net

Carl,

Funny you should mention the step breaking method. We are currently building 4 cones with 96" diameter tops, 10" diameter bottoms that are 96" tall, 1/4" steel material. They are being built as 3 separate cones, the bottom and middle cones being made in 3 parts each, the top is 4 parts. We have to lay out the brake points on all of the pieces, they range from less that 1/4" apart to over 3", then brake them up, thankfully in a hydraulic press brake.

My $.02, Jim C Roberts

PS The pieces were cut with our plasma cutter, 7 sheets of metal per cone.