Force Requirements

[RustyH]

Evening All,

I'm after some guidance on how I calculate the force required to bend a piece of aluminium.
Basically, I want do design a device that will bend a 1mm thick piece of aluminium, about 500mm wide in to a U channel shape. I plan to use tool which is a U channel shape die, and a form tool that will slide in to the side and shape the aluminium in to the channel.

Any help would be hugely appreciated

Thanks
Russ

 

[Compositepro]

The radius of the bend is an important factor. I doubt that the tooling you describe will work so the force calculation really is not important.
You must over bend the aluminum to get it to end up at the correct bend angle. The amount of over-bend required will depend on the thickness and hardness of the aluminum, which will vary enough to require trial and error adjustments from batch to batch, or even part to part. Bending machines are really common and any one of them will easily handle bending thin aluminum. You can get a hand-powered press-brake from Harbor Freight for less than $300, which will cost less that custom tooling that does not work. However, if the bend radius is to sharp or too great an angle, the aluminum will crack. That will depend on the the grade of aluminum you use.

 

[drawoh]

RustyH,

What grade of aluminium is it?

--
JHG

 

[rb1957]

remember spring back (you can't fold metal over a mould and expect it to retain the shape).

ok, you can if you do complicated things (like form in O condition and heat treat after forming.


another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[RustyH]

Hi,

This is kind of what I want to do

Link

 

[SnTMan]

Well, get kind of one of those.

Regards,

Mike

The problem with sloppy work is that the supply FAR EXCEEDS the demand

 

[Tmoose]

Do you have a bench vise ?

 

[pylfrm]

RustyH,

The process and the finished part in that video looks pretty different from the description in your original post. You will probably get much more useful input if you post a drawing of the finished part you want, including dimensions and material specifications.

Is your goal specifically to design a device, or do you really just want a bunch of finished parts? What sort of quantity is planned?


pylfrm

 

[chicopee]

Will there be any extrusion of the wall of the U channel from the die set?