Press Brakes, Panel Benders
These machines form predetermined, simple to complex bends of sheet metal and plate material by clamping the workpiece between a matching punch and die. Press brakes can bend thin gauge sheet metal up to very thick plate, while panel benders are used to bend only gauge sheet metal. Press brakes typically cost less than panel benders, which usually employ some level of automation and produce many more parts per hour.
More Than One Way to Skin a Part: Where Fabrication and Machining Overlap
Don’t take the “hard limits” between machining and fabrication for granted. Their areas of overlap offer tremendous potential for savings. If you manufacture parts using both processes, take a second look at some of them to evaluate whether they could be produced more economically with a little sheet metal know-how and some outside-the-box thinking.
Don’t take the “hard limits” between machining and fabrication for granted. Their areas of overlap offer tremendous potential for savings. If you manufacture parts using both processes, take a second look at some of them to evaluate whether they could be produced more economically with a little sheet metal know-how and some outside-the-box thinking.
Does limited punching capacity and outsourcing lead times cause production delays in your shop? Here is a simple, affordable and effective system that can expand the capabilities of your press brakes, help streamline operations and eliminate the need for outsourcing or purchasing new equipment.
As the metal fabrication business remains strong, watch for more shops to adopt digitization, the principles of Industry 4.0 and integrated process flow as they move toward smaller batch sizes, shorter lead times, high-mix parts to compete – and to address the lack of skilled labor.
Bending thick plates requires more attention to certain details than lighter bending jobs. Here are some ways to get all your ducks in a row before you bend the first part, so that your job will go more smoothly and translate into more profitable production.
Shops are revisiting the use of material handling robots or human-collaborative robot (cobot) utilization for fulfilling diverse tasks with efficiency and accuracy – two things that are sometimes hard to find in human workers because of the growing skills gap.
Available in just one configuration, Trumpf’s TruBend 2100 is aimed at fabricators that don’t have enough volume to justify a high-end bending machine. Order the machine online directly from the company for $95,000.
Touted as the “E-standard of the future” for heavy-duty hydraulic press brakes, SafanDarley’s H-Brakes hydraulic press brakes range from 175 tons to 1250 tons in capacity and provide bending lengths from 3,100 mm to 6,220 mm.
MC Machinery Systems and Portuguese manufacturer Adira have formed a sales-and-service partnership to deliver press brakes with capacities ranging from 100 tons to more than 2,000 tons throughout North America.
Metal Forming & Fabricating Industry News
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