Press Break Capacity Aluminum vs Steel

[voxelman]

Northern Tool offers a 3-In-1 Shear, Brake and Roll that is rated for 20 Gauge steel. Would this be likely to handle .1 Aluminum Sheet?

[Geof]

"A voxel is a three dimensional pixel!"

No, not quite, a pixel is a picture element and has two dimensions, a voxel is a volume element and has three dimensions. A three dimensional pixel would have a total of six dimensions. I can barely bend my brain around curved space-time and the concept of four dimensions; six leaves me spinning my wheels.

I was too busy being a smartass and forgot this: I have used a similar brake rated for 18 gauge steel and had great difficulty bending 3/32" aluminum which is approximately twice the thickness. I think you would find this brake not suitable for about the same thickness.

[unterhaus]

there is no way it would work on .1 I was just bending .125 aluminum yesterday on a large box brake, and that takes two men and a boy. Is there such a thing as a cheap hydraulic press brake?

[Geof]

Originally Posted by unterhaus ....Is there such a thing as a cheap hydraulic press brake?

Define 'cheap'.

[ballendo]

Hello,

You can do .062 aluminum all day long. You can do short bends in .125 aluminum (8" or less) if you have optomised the machine AND added a second handle so you can pull from both sides and avoid torqueing the thing.

Make sure you're not trying to use 6061. It just cracks. 5052 is what we use mostly.

Mine is an Enco made in Feb of '94.

Some of the earlier ones had weak link arm castings and they will break if you push it too hard.

I've added a cnc back gauge to mine and it gets used nearly every day.

Hope this helps,

Ballendo

P.S. I've seen this being offered in a 40" version. IMO avoid it. the 30" version is working at the limits of the design and I'd not trust the 40" for much more than realy thin stock and/or short bends.

I spent a lot of time with mine getting it trued up. It works well now that it is tuned...

Originally Posted by voxelman Northern Tool offers a 3-In-1 Shear, Brake and Roll that is rated for 20 Gauge steel. Would this be likely to handle .1 Aluminum Sheet?

[ballendo]

Depends upon the width you need...

I made a 99 buck HF hydraulic press into a 16" wide brake. I've regularly bent 12 ga steel. And I've bent some 3/16 steel as well, but only short bends.

There are plans on ebay for making hydraulic press brakes (one is intended to be made using a cnc plasma cutter); but they didn't have the capability for fine bending that my work required. (most are air benders. Air bending means using the yield of the metal to locate and form the bend "naturally", as opposed to forcing it with a die.) I needed tight bends to prototype my roadrunner gantry router, so I designed my own.

My HF press brake also has a CNC backgauge. It's basically a 2nd draft of the one on my 3-in-1.

Hope this helps,

Ballendo

Originally Posted by unterhaus there is no way it would work on .1 I was just bending .125 aluminum yesterday on a large box brake, and that takes two men and a boy. Is there such a thing as a cheap hydraulic press brake?

[ballendo]

Originally Posted by unterhaus Is there such a thing as a cheap hydraulic press brake?

The least expensive one I know of--new at least-- is the foremost bantam line. 2",4' and 6' air-operated 12 and 20 ton press brakes. Nice tools.

as someone else wrote, define cheap<G> these are about $4K and go up from there.

Ballendo

[voxelman]

Originally Posted by ballendo Depends upon the width you need... Ballendo

12 inches is about the limit of the bends that I have been working on lately so I should probably say 18 inches to be safe.

I was working .9 nominal 5053 aluminum, 11 inches wide when the die bowed up and away from the bend distroying my 18 inch break. It had performed several previous bends of the same length.

[voxelman]

Originally Posted by Geof "A voxel is a three dimensional pixel!" No, not quite, a pixel is a picture element and has two dimensions, a voxel is a volume element and has three dimensions. A three dimensional pixel would have a total of six dimensions. I can barely bend my brain around curved space-time and the concept of four dimensions; six leaves me spinning my wheels.

In the traditional usage a voxel is characterized by three spatial dimensions x,y,z, a unit volume scale factor in each axis ie mm/voxel, um/voxel, etc, and an average volumetric value ie density, intensity, etc. In addition the origin of the volume may be offset from 0,0,0 by some known distance for reference to the source of the data or in the case of processing limitations to allow the correlation of multiple sub-volumes. Since virtually all 3D data is organized into slices that can be displayed as 2D images containing pixels it is commonly understood that voxels are 3D pixels.

Presenting volumetric data in 3D on a 2D display device requires the projection of the volumetric data to a plane. Seeing a voxel's position within the volume is accomplished using either a sequential slice projection over time or transparency. The brain is fooled into thinking it is seeing 3D by the geometry of the presentation. When using a 2D display device voxels are displayed and seen as pixels.

As computers and scanners became more capable time was added to the data structure and multiple volumes were taken at intervals dependent upon the sampling device ie CT scanner, MRI scanner, confocal microscope, seismic survey, etc.

I am now retired from this field but during the time I worked at Vital Images, Inc. (www.vitalimages.com) I taught short courses on the subject at Purdue, University of Wisconsin, UC Davis, Texas Tech, OSHA, MUSC, Wright Patterson AFB, etc.

[ballendo]

Originally Posted by voxelman 12 inches is about the limit of the bends that I have been working on lately so I should probably say 18 inches to be safe. I was working .9 nominal 5053 aluminum, 11 inches wide when the die bowed up and away from the bend distroying my 18 inch break. It had performed several previous bends of the same length.

I'm not sure I'm following you. You already had one of these and it broke when you did this?

Were you using one handle?

I'd consider the 3-in-1 a bit undersized in structure if this is your typical bend...

That's why I made the HF heavy duty version from their cheap hyd press. But it's limited to 16" bend length.

Ballendo

[voxelman]

Originally Posted by ballendo I'm not sure I'm following you... Ballendo

No I had a little 18" postwar Japanese box break that broke. The die sits on one side of a pair of facing lengths of ~2" angle iron about 18" long. The work piece is clamped between the die and the fixed piece of angle iron with an adjustable setback for the die. The die is a piece of 1/2" steel with slots cut in it a various useful locations for flanges. The moveable piece of angle iron with handles at each end folds up against the work piece bending it against the die. The last time I used it the work piece started to bend at the ends but then the die bowed in the middle and that was all she wrote.