Sheet metal productivity improvement through a new press brake design

Abstract

A new press brake design proposed as a reconfigurable bending press machine (RBPM) is reported. The design is a means of increasing sheet metal bending productivity. Conventional press brakes are dedicated machines with fixed capacity, but the RBPM has characteristics of a reconfigurable machine tool, which enables the new press brake to be scalable, customisable and flexible. The RBPM design has two major objectives, namely geometric transformation and productivity adjustment. Geometric transformation is achieved through vertical and horizontal reconfigurability, while productivity adjustment is enabled by plug and produce devices. Geometric transformation allows sheet metal benders to adjust the press brake's height and length, thus improving the capability of the RBPM. This allows small-scale manufacturers of sheet metal products such as door frames to be able to adjust their machines to produce various sizes of products at low cost. A scaled-down prototype was made to specifications of 1.2 m total length and total capacity 30 kN (3 tons) for bending aluminium sheets of up to 0.51 mm thickness.

Keywords:

• function driven object-oriented
• press brake
• quality function deployment
• reconfigurable bending press machine
• sheet metal bending

JEL classification:

• D20
• D24
• D29
• O30

Acknowledgements

The authors are very grateful to the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) for providing relentless support during the research; National Research Foundation (NRF), South Africa, for funding the research work; and the Technology Innovation Agency (TIA), South Africa. Any opinion, findings, recommen- dations and conclusion expressed in this material is that of the authors and TUT, NRF and TIA do not accept any liability whatsoever in this regard.