Stamping Presses
Stamping presses are metalworking machine tools that are designed and produced specifically to work with different types of dies, such as progressive stamping dies to deform the metal. As such, stamping presses used to cut or shape solid and/or molten metal materials can potentially meet the needs of any stamping or metal forming process. Processes like these include but are not limited to: blanking, piercing, die cutting (shearing), extruding, and deep drawing.
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Stamping Press Applications
These processes are engaged in fabrication parts and products for a variety of industries, such as electronics, industrial manufacturing, building and construction, aerospace, and automotive. Examples of applications for which their services are utilized include the fabrication of various housings for electronic/electrical devices, the fabrication of machine components and parts made from sheet metal, the fabrication of various household safety features and fixtures, the manufacturing of different structural components and internal parts and hardware of aircrafts and the manufacturing of automotive parts like terminal lead frames, connectors and engine mounts.
Design of Stamping Press
The basic stamping press design consists of a press frame, a ram, and a bolster plate. A ram, or a slide, is a reciprocating or moving part of the press upon which the upper die is mounted. A bolster plate, also known as a press bed, is a large, stationary block upon which the bottom part of a die, or the lower die, is clamped. Large stamping presses, which are frequently used for automotive applications, also have a die cushion attached to the bolster plate, which applies blank holder or counter draw forces. Die cushions are important when a single acting press performs deep drawing, the sheet metal forming process by which sheet metal is pulled, or drawn, into a forming die past the depth of its diameter via the mechanical action of a punch and is thus transformed. The ram, a solid piece of metal, is clamped to the top portion of the stamping die, where it acts like the hammer of a hammer and anvil duo. In other words, the ram provides the stroke needed to cause the die to form parts out of the raw material being fed through it after it has been unrolled from a coil and sent through a straightener. Note that this raw material is most likely being fed via another stamping press component, an automatic feeder. Typically, automatic feeders are electronically linked to presses via a programmable logic controller. To keep an eye on this process, stamping presses may additionally be equipped with a tonnage monitor, which is a meter that observes the amount of force behind each stroke.
Types of Stamping Presses
Stamping presses are classified in a few different ways, one of them being -acting presses. These include the aforementioned single acting presses, double acting presses, and rarely, triple acting presses. Single acting presses are characterized by a single ram, while double acting presses have a subdivided ram. The subdivided ram of a double acting press can manage multiple operations. For example, the first division of a ram may, in order to avoid wrinkles, manage blank holding, while the second may oversee the forming operation.
- Classification by Power Source
- Another way they are classified is by their power source. They may be sorted into two groups: mechanically driven presses and hydraulically driven presses. Mechanically driven presses have a few different options as to what type of mechanical drive they use to move the press’ ram, but mostly, they do so using eccentric drives. Hydraulically driven presses, on the other hand, exclusively perform this action using hydraulic cylinders. Mechanical stamping presses do offer the advantage of their ability to reach higher cycles in a shorter amount of time than hydraulic presses. However, hydraulic presses are still generally the preferred stamping press of the metalworking world. This is the case for a number of reasons, including most notably the fact that they allow for the constant application of press force during the stroke. Also, hydraulic stamping presses perform stamping processes with controlled force. Usually, tonnage delivered ranges between 20 and 10,000 tons; stroke lengths generally range between 10 mm and 800 mm. Hydraulic stamping presses may be outfitted with a variety of additional features, such as variable tonnage, overload protection, adjustable stroke, and adjustable speed. Though they work well with various processes, these stamping presses work exceptionally well with low speed or high speed tonnage blanking, deep drawing, compound die action (like blanking combined with coining or coining or forming) and, as opposed to displacement-type forming, force-type forming.