Bending of copper bus bar strips 2

[dshore]

[URL unfurl="true"]https://res.cloudinary.com/engineering-com/image/upload/v1721335251/tips/Eng_Tips_whuo1q.pdf[/url]Hello,

I am looking for some assistance regarding the bending of some thin (7 mm) bus bar copper strips (2 bends) to a specific engineered drawing shape. Attached drawing shows the dimensions in mm. The challenge is that these tips are affixed to a length of bus bar copper (see attached jpg photo, and the space between each strip is about 46 mm.

Any suggestions on bending ideas or other forums that might be of further help?

Thank you

ds

 

[Heaviside1925]

OP,
Can you use a metal bender / brake? I know they make them for the dimensions you are indicating. If you don't want to buy one, most machine shops have one or you could make your own.

 

[SWComposites]

Yeah, should be doable on a metal brake forming machine.

 

[MintJulep]

Taken as a sketch, the shape you show shouldn't present any special challenges to an experienced bending shop.

As an engineering drawing, it's likely setting up for unreasonable expectations and arguments during inspection.

Copper is soft and squishy, so it wants to flow out at the edges and certainly doesn't get thicker at the bend as shown.

Asking for dimensions to the 1/100 of a mm will force expensive secondary operations that in all likelihood really aren't necessary.

7 mm is not a stock metric size. Given your nominal 25.40 mm dimension (aka 1 inch) perhaps your thinking 3/16". That's also not a common thickness.

The design is incredibly wasteful. Perhaps you could cut two out of a single strip to improve things a bit, but even with that a lot of expensive copper will be wasted.

Consider making the fingers separately and brazing them to the main bar.

Here are some examples of what real copper bus bars look like.

Here's a bunch of good information about copper bus bars:

https://p537794.webspaceconfig.de/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Copper-for-Busbars.pdf