Wire Forms

About Wire Forms and Wire Form Manufacturers Including: Wire Baskets, Wire Displays, Wire Fabrications, Wire Hooks, Wire Products, Wire Racks & Wire Shelves.

Wire forming is the process of bending and manipulating wire into wire forms, wire racks or specific shapes for both industrial and commercial use. Few other industrial products are used in such a wide range of industries as wire forms; products made by the wire forming process include wire hooks, wire shelves, commercial wire display racks and wire baskets. These wire products are used in commercial, residential and industrial settings for storage, product placement and cooking applications; wire springs, wire hooks and clips are also used as hardware. Wire fabrications processes typically include secondary services such as welding, joining, nickel plating and powder coating in order to ready wire form products for industrial applications or the consumer market.

Wire forms are important components in manufacturing industries not only as consumer items, but also as springs, hooks, coils, pins, rings and clips which operate in industrial equipment. Commercial products include product display wire racks and wire baskets used for storage and point of purchase displays in retail stores. The medical industry uses wire baskets because of their ability to protect various medical supplies while keeping them sterile. Residences purchase storage shelves, laundry hooks and decorative wire baskets, and wire forms are incorporated into many consumer products, including grills, toys and football helmets. Wire form manufacturers also produce various custom wire formed products including motor mounts, water intake screens and finger guards. Custom forms are commonly created for companies requiring wire forms for a specific application.

Methods for wire forming and shaping metal wire include swaging, bending, fourslide and CNC machine wire forming, as well as various types of coil forming. Manufacturers of wire form products typically provide assistance with design and engineering, integrating CNC, CAD and CAM processes into the wire forming process performed by wire forming machines. Metal stamping is often used in the wire forming process to ensure forms are straight or to flatten sections of wire. Coil and spring forming machines wind wire into spirals or rings using CNC or CAD automation. Fourslide wire forming is an advancement of metal stamping that involves a vertically positioned center post and four slides running horizontally.

These elements of wire forming work together to automatically receive coiled wire from a reel and then straighten and cut it according to specified part designs. Once programmed, automated wire forming machines are capable of continuously fabricating wire parts or complete wire forms, depending on the complexity of the wire form design.  For more complex forms or for forms which require multiple pieces to be joined, secondary welding processes are necessary and may be performed by hand or by automated assembly machines. Wire forms are made from various gauges of ferrous and nonferrous metals, including steel, stainless steel, copper, brass, aluminum and alloys. Many wire forms are nickel plated, powder coated, painted or plastic coated to protect against corrosion and to be made more aesthetically pleasing.

Wire Forms and Wire Form Manufacturers Images Provided by Northern Wire Products

Wire Forms and Wire Form Manufacturers Image Provided by Merrill Manufacturing Corp.

Wire Form Types

• Coil is wire wound into rings or spirals.
  
• Flat springs are flat or curved pieces of steel shaped into a coil; flat springs have a nearly constant force.
  
• Medical wire forms are used primarily in orthopedic and prosthetic devices, and they provide a positive closure.
  
• S Hooks are wire hooks used to connect or hang components.
  
• Spring washers are springs that store the energy used to tighten the nut or bolt they are under.
  
• Springs are coiled material that deflect when load is applied. Removing the load will cause the spring to return to its previous position.
  
• Wire baskets are used in various industries to store and display products.
• Wire displays are often used to display books, food, clothing and various other products. Wire displays can be custom designed for manufacturer needs and desires.
  
• Wire hooks are curved pieces of metal used to hold things.
• Wire racks are available in various materials and options, and are used in many retail situations, including those dealing with food and clothing.
  
• Wire shelves are produced for both industrial and consumer use because they are versatile and sturdy with a variety of load strengths and wire densities.

Wire Form Terms

Active Coils - Coils that freely deflect when under a load.

Closed Ends - The ends of the coils touch because the pitch end is reduced on a compression spring.

CNC (Computer Numerical Control) - Machines with a computer memory, often used in manufacturing and production of wire forms.

Deflection - During the application or removal of the burden, the motion of the spring arms or ends.

Elastic Limit - The strain and manipulation a material can endure without lasting set.

Fine Blanking - A technique of precision blanking in which the material is cut smoothly and accurately without needing secondary operations.

Free Angle - The slope between the torsion spring arms at the unloaded position for the spring wire form.

Gauge - The measurement of the thickness of a wire used in wire forms.

Helix - In open or closed forms, the spiral shape of the spring.

Hooks - The open ends of extension springs.

Hysteresis - Lost mechanical energy during a spring's cyclic loading and unloading.
Hysteresis is relative to the space among the loading and unloading deflection curves.

Load - Applied force that causes deflection with a spring.

Multislide Stamping - Stamping or forming from multiple directions in pieces and segments.

Pitch - In the wire of active coils, the measure of the distance from the center of one adjacent active coil to another.

Rate (R) - The modification in load for each unit deflection, typically expressed in pounds per inch (N/mm).

Set - Permanent deformation that happens from the stressing of a spring past the material's elastic limit.

Spring Index -The ratio of mean coil diameter to wire diameter.

Stress Relieve - Exposing a spring to a treatment of low heat, which results in the reduction of residual stresses.

Torque - Equation measurement of torsion spring's twisting action, relative to the distance from the axis of the spring body.

Wire Forming - The forming of wire forms.