Flatness "Jig" 1

[BAMTech]

Hello,
I currently work for a company that makes products out of moly alloys, aluminum and stainless steel. These products are about 1 mm to 4 mm thick and 100mm to 300 mm in width. These products are sent out to be anodized or coated for some sort of protection.
When the parts are sent back we check to correct the flatness of the pieces, which are usually out of spec. The flatness is corrected by bending the parts over angle iron, marble slabs, and rods, all surfaces are protected to prevent scratches to the coated surface.
Our inspection team has become quite proficient at correcting flat parts on these pieces. However the learning curve is quite high and the work can be very tedious on high volume orders. Throwing more people to straighten the pieces results in little improvement since all are not trained or experienced.
I was wondering if anyone had any processes or methodologies, outside of bending the pieces by hand, that would streamline the correction process.
Thank you
_Brian

 

[MikeHalloran]

You are doing it wrong.

Inspectors should not be modifying parts in order to make them pass inspection.

Follow the bent parts upstream and find out who is bending them, and how.

Fix _that_ process.



Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[hendersdc]

I agree with Mike that you should try and correct the process causing the bending.

I have seen some thin sheet metal parts get an arc to them caused by a lot of holes and a turret punch. A slip roll made short work of flattening them out.

Doug

 

[BAMTech]

The parts are milled and thoroughly inspected in house before they are are shipped off to be coated/anodized. We do get them within +/-.001" for flatness prior to shipping, however they regularly are returned out of spec do to the heat of the coating process. We'd love to do the coating in house however the environmental safe guards and regulations, that come with this process, opens up a very large can of worms.

 

[racookpe1978]

Has anybody from your office (engineering or manufactoring, not contracting or QC) walked through observing every phase of the coating process? Seems odd they (the coating company) would just shrug off something this significant to your cost and time impact for re-assembly as "heat"

 

[BAMTech]

The problem with anodization and Teflon coating is that its a harsh process and doesn't give much leeway to be gentle and delicate with the parts. Toss in the electrical arc affecting the surface tensions of the thin materials to buckle and move, you tend to lose some where between .010-.015 flatness with the parts.

 

[DAVIDSTECKER]

Have you had the raw material stress relieved before you start mill it?