MECHANICAL TO PLM

STAMPING BASICS                         Stamping offers precision and good reproducibility for sheet metal. In this, more consideration is given to tooling costs over lifespan of production.      a)      Blanking :-             Dimension checks are made at the shear area (punch side) as the die side accuracy is affected.         1.       Corners-                May be sharp. To reduce tooling costs, radius is specified as ½                                        ...

CNC TURRET BASICS              CNC Turret presses are used for low to medium quantity production of sheet metal parts. By utilizing standard tool, turrets are suitable for both highly flexible production of prototypes and inexpensive production quantities.   1.      Tolerances :-                         Feature to feature tolerance = +/- .004”                Punched Hole tolerance = +/- .002”          For dimensioning purpose, datum is preferred for the possible hole centers, since edges or corners can be tapered or misaligned.   2.      Special Forms :-        Many special features are created in flat shee...

LASER CUTTING BASICS                         Laser Cutting is often utilized in prototyping and production parts of sheet metal. This process is good for intricate details and irregular contours.        a)                  Tolerances :-           Feature to feature tolerance on for the laser cutter is +/- .004”. The smallest cut is determined by beam width or .008” wide.        b)                 Material Restrictions :-           There are three factors depending on material restrictions for laser cutting:-                                 1.    ...

FORMING BASICS        i)                    Press Brake Forming :-              The  fundamental advantage of press brake as a forming tool is its flexibility. Standard vee-dies are used for cost savings on small lots and prototypes. These rules increases manufacturability of designs:-       a)       Dimension the part in a single direction wherever possible       b)       Use consistent bend radius for all bends per part       c)       Generally, dimensioning should be done from a feature to an edge         Tolerances in the title block of a drawing may be restrictive for certain dimensions and angles, while appropriate for others due to above guidelines. ...

DESIGN GUIDELINES FOR SHEETMETAL               The sheet metal in most of the industries has been used quite frequently. The main reason for this is because it is lightweight and can be bent into variety of shapes. There are certain ways to provide dimensions while applying sheet metal parts in drawings. The guidelines of dimensioning differ with the operations used for obtaining a particular shape.               To start with, we need to know what a sheet metal is. Sheet metal is a metal formed by certain process into thin or flat pieces, in which pieces which are extremely thin are foils or leaves and which are thicker than 6mm (.25in) are plates. The basics for designing a sheet metal has been classified as per the operations carried out:-           a)       FORMINGBASICS     ...