Design and manufacture of a die/jig 3

[Speedingdemon]

hello,

I am wondering how long it would typically take one person (with experience) to design and manufacture a jig and then a die from scratch? Also, what materials would be needed? The tools would be used in the manufacturing of, say, a heavy duty wheelbarrow (Die for pressing the body into shape and Jig for making the tubular frames).

 

[ornerynorsk]

Speedingdemon, there are a lot of variables. Seemingly simple details can add/subtract tooling time and cost. You need to bring the design to an experienced toolmaker and discuss it, and they will be able to give you a pretty good estimate. A key factor that possibly has the greatest impact on tooling cost and complexity is how many do you need to produce per hour, per day, per year. The greater the throughput, the less manual handling of material and parts you want. As processes are automated, more features need to be incorporated into the tooling.

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

 

[mcgyvr]

speedingdemon is their in-house tooling guys boss...
"200 hours John... thats ridiculous... you're fired"

 

[Speedingdemon]

All I need to know is how long (roughly) it would take for one machinist to design and manufacture 1 jig and 1 die from scratch. I cannot find this information anywhere on the Internet and I don't want to go round, phoning companies and waste their time. All answers so far have given me little or no information on the question asked

 

[ornerynorsk]

Yeah, people on eng tips aren't always cordial and diplomatic, but the way a question is asked will bring that on yourself.

There is no pat answer to your question. Here are only some of the questions that need to be answered before even a ballpark estimate could be given:

1. How big is the wheelbarrow tub.
2. What is the material and gauge.
3. How deep is the draw and do the sidewalls have adequate draft.
4. Does the trimmed edge need beading/curling after drawing.
5. How many parts will need to be made over the life of the die, what is the daily throughput.
6. What is precisely meant as "jig" for the tubular frame. Is it a bending jig, welding jig, or . . .
7. Once the above questions are taken into consideration, that leads to additional details that must be answered.
8. Will it be designed with CAD software or pen and paper.
9. Do you have large, high-horsepower CNC machinery at your disposal, or is there some as-of-yet-unknown constraint in the manufacturing of the tooling.

We make multi-plane sheetmetal forming tools frequently. Low volume stuff is made from 1018 and case hardened, higher volume stuff gets made from 4140 and the contact surfaces flame hardened. These first 2 dies will make use of pre-cut blanks, often laser-cut instead of stamped. Class A dies require tool steel, no shortcuts. This one aspect of die material can mean a difference of double the time spent building a tool, because D2 machines a lot slower than 1018. So you can see that there is no pat answer to your question, as asked. Like they say, a question asked well is a question half answered.

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

 

[mcgyvr]

4 to 8 weeks

 

[Speedingdemon]

ornerynorsk you are right, I shouldn't have snapped.

Thank you for breaking this down for me. Under a lot of pressure and can't even pass the first hurdle! It's basically a team-working exercise but the guy can't even tell us left from right! I've stressed profusely that designing and manufacturing 1 jig and 1 Die from scratch is completely wasteful and unjustified but that's apparently what we have to do...

Anyway, the questions you have displayed (thank you for taking the time ) are mostly unanswerable as we are to 'assume' many things (silly but my hands are tied). However, The questions I can answer, are below:

1. How big is the wheelbarrow tub.

Body Length = 850mm Max Body Depth = 260mm Capacity = 90Litres​

2. What is the material and gauge.

Tub is made from Galvanised Steel with a 0.7mm Body Gauge​

3. How deep is the draw and do the sidewalls have adequate draft.

I'm sorry I have no idea​

4. Does the trimmed edge need beading/curling after drawing.

Yes, curled I believe​

5. How many parts will need to be made over the life of the die, what is the daily throughput.

1000 units. Don't worry about durability or reliability, It's only intended for those 1000 units​

6. What is precisely meant as "jig" for the tubular frame. Is it a bending jig, welding jig, or . . .

Ah, apologies, it would be a bending jig used for the Stove Enamelled Tubular Frame of each wheelbarrow​

7. Once the above questions are taken into consideration, that leads to additional details that must be answered.
8. Will it be designed with CAD software or pen and paper.

CAD, I'm assuming​

9. Do you have large, high-horsepower CNC machinery at your disposal, or is there some as-of-yet-unknown constraint in the manufacturing of the tooling.

Again, I'm assuming any sort of CNC machinery needed would be usable for construction​

Because it is an exercise, none of this is 'real world' stuff. All theoretical (however illogical the whole conundrum is). What I need at the end of the day is a rough and ready guesstimate of each one that I can actually justify, instead of plucking something out of thin air!

Thank you very much in advance ornerynorsk!

As for capnhook, your sarcasm enchants me. As a wise little Rabbit once said, 'If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all.'

 

[racookpe1978]

It will be cheaper (faster) if you relax your tolerances: A Chinese wheellbarrow may be "in tolerance" for Walmart with a "fit" tolerance two to five times larger than the the thickness of the sheetmetal itself.

A car fender die (which will run tens of thousands of fenders) needs to finish each bent edge much, much tighter.

 

[MikeHalloran]

Two blocks of die steel that big for the tub will probably cost $50k, plus shipping, plus machining, plus engineering time.
Figure $500k ready to make the first part, not including the actual press, and not including the trim die and the edge curling tools.

A bending jig can probably be done for $50k, unless you want to work with prefinished steel tube; that will cost more.

Painting will cost a fortune either way; modern finishing lines have to meet all sorts of environmental standards, and you need a big place to store all the paperwork.

Total, maybe you can get by with $1e6 up front to start making wheelbarrows, not including the building.




Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[ornerynorsk]

In reality, a tool set of this size could easily have between 300 and 500 hours in it, maybe more. There are still a ton of undefined variables. BTW, a 0.7mm gauge thickness would not be considered heavy duty.

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

 

[dhengr]

Speedingdemon:
Damn dumb internet, don’t know nothin. How can you ever pretend to be doing engineering or anything technical if the internet and CAD don’t do it for you. You say.... “ I don't want to go round, phoning companies and waste their time.” So, you come to E-Tips to waste our time. Why not ask your Prof. or TA, your tuition is paying their salaries, and they should know that you might not be learning much, because you just got it off the internet, instead of thinking the problem through. If you think a little bit and read btwn. the lines a bit, you have already been given some darn good advice, ideas, and food for thought in some of the above posts. If you can’t come up with, and answer, a whole bunch of questions like Ornerynorsk has started to list, you have no idea how to even begin to approach your problem.

 

[Speedingdemon]

Excellent, thank you for the advice everyone