Blog - Page 12 of 18 -

Copper bars for electrical motor contacts

Monday, January 27th, 2014

Copper bars

Another simple part I spotted while walking through the workshop today. Simple part but we still used our Safan guillotine to cut the copper bar to length, deburr belts to smooth off the sharp ends, fly presses to pierce the 2 different holes and one of our Trumpf 7036 CNC press brakes to form the 2 bends. The range of skills and processes needs to make the simplest of parts shows the range of services we can offer our customers.

We once had a customer who we only ever manufactured flat panels with holes in, a simple CNC punch press job. After several years of doing the same flat sheet metal panels he came in to see me one day and said in amazement “I didn’t know you could bend sheet metal” after seeing our factory. Now who was at fault? Me for not selling the services I had to offer or the customer for not asking. Well it was my fault but you cannot keep mentioning services you don’t currently offer a customer on the off chance they may need it. I guess nowadays the internet with web sites and blog posts enables us all to demonstrate our non mainstream services to current and potential customers without a hard sell. I’m much happier with increasing my customer base and helping my existing customers with their project problems in this way rather than knocking on the door and pushing sales leaflets in their hands. What do you think?

Laser cutting sheet metal materials

Thursday, January 23rd, 2014

Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser

Being a fibre laser allows us to cut sheet metal and plate materials that would be difficult or impossible for conventional CO2 laser cutting machines. Materials such as brass alloys and copper have always been difficult to laser cut but not any more. With the same laser cutting head we can cope with all ferrous and non ferrous materials including zinc coated steels. Using special plastic coating parts can be laser cut in aluminium and stainless steel without the need for etch cuts cutting down processing time and producing a more economical part with a better edge finish whist protecting the component surface in production.

Laser cutting stainless steel

Stainless steel sheet and plate up to 15mm thick can be cut with our Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser with excellent results. Thicker plate will need the use of nitrogen gas in cutting for an oxide free profile edge but thinner sheets can be cut with compressed air and still produce a good edge finish. The speed of the fiber laser allows thin stainless steel to be cut at over 25M/min enabling outer profiles to be cut very quickly and also internal cutouts and holes to be produces fast and with no special tooling needs. We are already starting to produce excellent results with compressed air cutting and will be producing more blog posts on this subject soon.

Laser cutting aluminium

We can cut a range of aluminium alloys and thicknesses using Nitrogen or compressed are with the laser beam. Depending on the aluminium thickness the parts cut may not need to be deburred after cutting.

Fly press sheet metal work

Monday, January 20th, 2014

Brass electrical connector created with bespoke press tooling

PCB connector brackets created with standard fly press tooling

Both of these small sheet metal parts have been manufactured using fly presses with standard and bespoke tooling. They show the great flexibility that can be achieved with our fly presses. We can pierce holes and slots, rad and notch corner profiles, crop bar and angle to length and form different shapes. Fly presses are useful to test out new designs and experiment with forms before committing to full production tooling.

Do you have a project but not sure whether you need tooling of how to go about have your parts manufactured, give us a call and we will be happy to help you.

Sheet metal CNC punching forms, it’s so easy

Thursday, January 16th, 2014

Trumpf 3000R CNC punch press in action

Trumpf 3000R CNC punch press producing formed tabs

We can always form location tabs, earth tabs and locating fingers for assembly work using our fly presses. We often do this to trial a design idea or for projects that don’t have the volumes to justify special CNC tooling. In this case the project had enough volume and repeated regularly to justify spending some money on tooling saving on each part and more than paying back the cost of the tooling within months. The punch press also punched all the other holes and outer profile using standard tooling producing the parts ready for bending up on our Edwards Pearson CNC press brakes.

CNC punched nest of aluminium lighting gear trays

CNC punched nest of sheet metal

The CNC punched nest is created by following the program within our Radan software. The holes are punched in first followed by the outer rectangular profile (which is created with overlapping hits of 70mm x 5mm tooling) and finally the upform tabs are pressed into the sheet aluminium.

CNC formed tabs in aluminium sheet metal

Forming tabs with CNC punch press tooling

Once a shape has been CNC punched out it frees the final tab up to be formed up from the sheet metal. In this case the forming tool produce 2 tabs at the same time saving time in the cycle of the machine and money. It so happens that on this project these gear trays are required in sufficient numbers and repeat regularly to not only justify the cost of the CNC form tooling but having a single hit punch tool which again saves time and money when processing hundreds of gear trays at a time.

Spot welded sheet metal housings

Monday, January 13th, 2014

Spot welded Zintec housings

Spot welded sheet metal housings

Spot welding is a useful manufacturing technique which has been used for many years to join 2 or more layers of sheet metal together. The automotive industry have used this process to assembly car body sections onto chassis and frame work sections with great success. Here at V and F Sheet Metal we use spot welding to assembly various housings where fully welded TiG or MiG joints wouldn’t be suitable. If we were to TiG weld the joints on these housings there would be a lot of heat from the TiG welding process which would burn off the Zintec coating on the mild steel. The welds would need to be cleaned off smooth (removing even more Zintec zinc coating) and the overall production time would be considerably more than the spot welding and as time is money we go with spot welding for these parts. Each individual spot weld joint isn’t as strong as a fully TiG welded run so we make up with a series of spot welds to provide the right amount of strength for this housing.

Spot welded Zintec housings

Spot welded sheet metal housings

The spot welding is not only quicker and therefore cheaper to produce but the skill level isn’t the same as TiG welding enabling us to involve more people in the factory with this manufacturing process. This batch of 200 Zintec housings are made from a light gauge (0.9mm thick) and were ideal for spot welding. Once the fabricated assemblies were powder coated the spot welds were hardly visible and for the application that this housing this used for this was not a problem.

Spot welded and TiG welded mild steel housings

Mild steel fabricated housings

This batch of mild steel housings were manufactured in January 2014 and used many production processes. They started out life as a 3D models of all the individual sheet metal parts within our Radan modelling CAD/CAM software. The parts were then tooled and laid out on a nest for CNC punching. The parts were all CNC punched from mild steel in sets, deburred and CNC bent up using our Trumpf 7036 CNC press brakes. The threaded bushes were inserted before all the corner joints were TiG welded up. After the welds were cleaned off the brackets and angle plates were spot welded in position as seen here. There’s also a good view of ventilation louvres which have been formed into the housing sides while being CNC punched on our Trumpf 3000R CNC punch press.

If you have a sheet metal fabrication project that might need spot welding please give us a call and we will be happy to advise you and provide you with quotations to produce your project.

CNC bending sheet metal brackets

Thursday, January 9th, 2014

CNC bending brackets on a Trumpf 7036

Small aluminium brackets being bent on a Trumpf 7036 CNC press brake

It still amazes me how many different types of bracket we manufacture here at V and F Sheet Metal. I’ve just walked past our 2 Trumpf 7036 CNC press brakes this morning and spotted these 2 brackets being bent up, both in aluminium. The bracket on the left is a simple 1 bend angle bracket that was programmed, set up with the tooling shown and started within minutes. It’s used in the electronic industry to mount a PCB within a chassis. The bracket on the right is a more complex bracket with several bends and flaps folded back down on themselves to form safe edges. These brackets are used within a product for holding a filter glass in place in a fibre optic light fitting.

Both brackets show how flexible the Trumpf 7036 is and how flexible we have to be everyday in producing different parts again and again for our customers from sample 1 off’s to higher volume batches of many thousands off. The brackets may be thin gauge parts like those shown here or 10mm thick mild steel of 8mm stainless steel. We have to turn our hand to everything that our customers ask of us and if we cannot do it in house we always have a contact that can so we can offer the complete service for our customers.

Sheet metal CNC bent brackets

Sunday, January 5th, 2014

Stainless steel brackets

Stainless steel brackets

These stainless steel brackets can be produced as blanks by either CNC punching or laser cutting, barrel deburred and then CNC bent using a Trumpf 7036 press brake. These small stainless steel brackets are produces by us on batches of 500 at a time and are typical of the sheet metal work that we often make for our UK customers. These particular brackets are used by our customer to construct children’s play ground equipment.

Mild steel brackets

Mild steel brackets

These mild steel brackets are a great example of sheet metal work produced on a CNC punch press. There are 2 sizes of countersunk holes which have been formed in the CNC punch press by first piercing a small pilot hole and then a forming operation carried out by forming the countersink with a conical shaped tool in a single hit. The large radius bend was achieved with a special shaped rad tool in a Trumpf 7036 CNC press brake in a single form operation.

Mild steel welded sheet metal work

Mild steel welded sheet metal work

These mild steel sheet metal fabrications have been CNC punched and CNC bent on Trumpf manufacturing equipment and then TiG welded on the corner joints. The final component has the joints cleaned off with sanders and then zinc plated and clear passivated. These sheet metal components are typical of the small components we manufacture being 75mm long and manufactured from 1.2mm thick mild steel sheet.

Sheet metal work assembly software model

Saturday, January 4th, 2014

Radan 3D modelled sheet metal fabrication assembly

Sheet metal work assemblies created in 3D software

Before we can start to manufacture all but the simplest of sheet metal parts we produce a 3D model within our Radan software. This has the advantage of trying out the fit of parts together, the correct alignment of fixing holes and the ability to add in production aids if welding such as tabs and slots. All these advantages help us to reduce the chance of mistakes in manufacturing but they also help us to inform our customers of possible errors in their design before we commit to cutting metal. If our customers have designed a sheet metal assembly without 3D software they may not be aware that some parts do not work perfectly together and we can then send them 3D images to help them visualise their design before we get started in production. All this is provided by us for free and part of working in partnership with our customers to improve the design / manufacturing cycle.

Want to know more about Radan software and recent projects please take a look at Radan sheet metal software or 3D sheet metal models

Laser cutting sheet metal

Friday, January 3rd, 2014

Laser cutting sheet metal with a Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber

We have now been using our new laser cutter for 2 months and we are really pleased with the quality of parts we are producing from it. Whether it’s using compressed air, nitrogen or oxygen as the assist gases we can be sure of a clean edge cut and high production rates. We are still using the Trumpf laser to produce parts that we would have CNC punched so we have more capacity now for urgent jobs. During 2014 we will start to experiment with thicker materials so where we would have sub-contracted out the laser cutting we will now be able to offer this service in house. We have also produced sheet metal work from brass and copper which is ideal on a fibre laser but not good on CO2 lasers making this choice of laser cutter so flexible for us and our customers. If you want to see more examples of laser cut work we are adding pages to the gallery section of the website and there is our YouTube channel with plenty of examples of the laser cutter working on real sheet metal work projects. Have a job you want to have laser cut, please give us a call or e-mail a drawing and we will be happy to help you.

Sheet metal lighting gear trays

Thursday, January 2nd, 2014

CNC punched gear trays

Simple gear trays recently produced by V and F Sheet Metal

Lighting gear trays are often manufactured by us to hold all the electrical gear for LED and florescent tube style fittings. The base material may be mild steel and powder coated white or a pre-coated white mild steel depending on the volume and price constrictions. We can also make them in aluminium to help as a combined heat sink with LED lighting options. The white surface is normally used as a simple reflector as well keeping the amount of parts down in the overall design and therefore reducing the cost. Some of the holes have been plunged formed to allow self tapping screws to bight into a thin gauge of material without stripping the threads which is simple on a Trumpf CNC punch press. These gear trays have been punched ready for T5 lamps and will have two bends along their length to stiffen up the trays before assembly. These are typical of the CNC punched work we produce all the time for our lighting customers but similar non-lighting work is being produced every day of the week and we would be happy to quote to produce your sheet metal trays, boxes, brackets etc

Lighting reflectors CNC punched from sheet metal

Wednesday, January 1st, 2014

CNC punched reflector aluminium

These large lighting reflector panels have been CNC punched out using common line cutting where possible but still retaining enough strength within the nest to run a full sheet without stopping. The lighting reflector panels are used to construct an eight piece assembled reflector for light fittings installed in industrial green houses. The Miro4 material has a plastic protective film which once peeled off reveals a highly polished surface and a very efficient lighting reflector.

Reflector aluminium CNC punched nest

The small reflectors have been CNC punched from a pre-anodised semi-specular material from Alanod. The blank shown here is bent up into a small housing which fits inside an aluminium casting and directs all the light output through a cover glass. The final light fitting is installed in walls near stair ways to add an accent of light to each stair in hotels and receptions areas. Again, we can see that we have worked to use common line cutting to reduce manufacturing time on the punch press and fit as many on a sheet as possible to keep the part cost as low as possible.

CNC punched Alanod 33PG reflector aluminium used for a light fitting

Great image of a reflector CNC punched from Alanod 33PG pre-anodised aluminium reflector material. The parts have been CNC punched out from a standard sheet on our Trumpf 200R CNC punch press using a range of standard CNC tooling which can be accessed on our web site tooling library pages. All the tabs seen here will be fitted into slots in mating reflectors to provide an easy method of assembly for our customer without any fixings to work about. We are always looking for new ways to help our customers save money and improve their product designs, give us a try if you have any sheet metal lighting products you want manufacturing.

Sheet metal enclosures

Tuesday, December 31st, 2013

Sheet metal enclosures can come in many forms. There might be the electrical / electronic rack mounting control enclosures often used with 19″ equipment. There can be sheet metal boxes that simply enclosure equipment e.g. pump housings, electrical switch / relay boxes or security enclosures. These examples of enclosure shown here are simple mild steel housings produced on CNC punch presses with some interesting features which have been formed in the metal. Being sub-contract manufacturers we are free to help you with your ideas giving you an enclosure that is produced to your design and cost restraints. We have over 25 years of experience in producing sheet metal enclosures for a wide range of industrial uses and would be happy to take a look at your ideas and help refine your design to really suit the advantages of manufacturing in sheet metal today with the very latest computer controlled equipment. To see some of the stages we go through in producing enclosures please follow this link: sheet metal box fabrication

2013 has been a great year of change for V and F Sheet Metal

Monday, December 30th, 2013

New home for V and F Sheet Metal in 2013

The move to a new manufacturing home for V and F Sheet Metal was completed at the end of 2013. We were so pleased to have the room to plan out a more efficient factory for all our sheet metal work processes from CNC punching, CNC bending, welding bays, cleaning up areas, ancillary processes and extra storage. For those of you who had visited our old home in Mitchell Close will know that over 20 years we had a range of units but all with the purpose of building the company up to the point that one day we could have our own factory and yard and now it has been achieved. One of the problems with our old setup was the lack of space to invest in laser cutting technology which the move to Brunel Way has given us and in the autumn of 2013 that investment become a reality with the arrival of our Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser.

Brand new laser technology

We were so excited to see our new laser turn up after it’s journey all the way from Switzerland. It took 7 days of installation, commissioning and training before we could cut any metal but it was well worth the wait. As well as the major investment in laser technology we have installed a new fast up stroking saw which is ideal for cutting aluminum extrusion, tube, bar, angle and strip. It’s been used on LED heat sinks, ventilation outlet grilles, shelving systems supports to name but a few.

Laser cutting on a Trumpf 3030 fiber

Here we are in the first few days after laser cutter had been set up loading sheet metal onto the pallet changer ready to run a new job for one of our customers.

We are looking to consolidate in 2014 with more software training on our new laser cutting machine to get the best from it’s technology. We will be upgrading our office computer systems to take advantage of faster database systems and it will soon be time to upgrade our systems server again, where do the years go!

Sheet metal inserts

Sunday, December 29th, 2013

Sheet metal components with threaded inserts

Both of these images show recent sheet metal projects with hank bushes inserted. They are both manufactured from zintec coated mild steel but inserts can be pressed into stainless steel, un-coated mild steel before zinc plating or powder coating, aluminium alloys, copper, brass and pre-painted steel materials.

M10 hank bushes

Zinc plated hank bushes

We have a great choice of sheet metal inserts that we can help you with from threaded self clinch studs and bushes, plain pins, anchor rivet bushes, thumb screws or earth points. We often insert these parts into sheet metal lighting gear trays, electronics chassis, fixing plates and brackets using our Haeger bush inserter or our fly presses. The ability to fix a thread in place is ideal for designs where a component may need to be removed and replaced several times e.g. inspection plate, gear box cover, pump adjustment bracket etc. The range of inserts is enormous and there should be a solution to your needs, if you need any advise in finding the right part please just ask us.

Laser cutting sheet metal December 2013

Saturday, December 28th, 2013

Well here is our brand new Trumpf 3030 fiber laser machine cutting zintec coated mild steel sheet metal plates. We knew that the laser cutting would be great for cutting out complex sheet metal shapes with complicated internal and external profiles that had to be CNC nibbled before on our punch presses. We also knew that the laser cutter would be much better at processing thicker material than we could CNC punch as we had already started to outsource laser cutting. What we didn’t factor in was the speed it can produce simple parts in thin sheet metal gauges and so clean that many deburring operations can be eliminated.

Fast Tube by Casper

These zintec parts are being laser cut simply using compressed air as the assist gas and being allowed to fall through the bed and onto a conveyor that runs under the machine. The parts are then collected in a tray and simple picked up at the end of the laser cutting operation. Using compressed air on thin gauge zintec parts is perfect as it produces a clean edge cut and is cheaper than using either oxygen or nitrogen as the assist gas.

If you have any sheet metal projects that you might be thinking of having laser cut or CNC punched and you are not sure which way to go why not let us take a look at your ideas and advise you on the best method of production for you.

CNC programming laser cut sheet metal work

Friday, December 20th, 2013

CNC program for Trumpf 3030 fibre laser

CNC programming laser cut parts

CNC programming a laser cutting machine is so easy compared with programming a CNC punch press. Having only one tool, the laser beam itself, there are no tools to be concerned with. No tool angles, die clearances, side loadings, nibbling issues with multi-tools etc. There is also no clamp zone to work around allowing the software / programmer to use the whole sheet to find the most economical use of the material. You can see this in the picture here taken from a recent prototype set of parts that the individual parts can be fitted together and right across the sheet to get the best fit. The way a program cuts the sheet metal parts is also different. With a CNC punch press we will select a tool and punch all these holes across multiple parts with that tool and then put it back on the tool rail. We then select a second tool and repeat the process until all tools have been used and the component is complete. If there is a problem with the CNC punch press program it is not seen until the hole sheet is complete. With laser cutting because there is only one tool the laser beam itself we can cut one component completely and take it out of the sheet to check it before going one to make changes or complete the batch.

With Radan taking care of most of the basic laser programming with a simple click of the mouse we can concentrate on getting the part development right for you and cutting parts ready for manufacturing. We will be posting far more images of laser cutting and examples of finished components of our gallery pages so keep an eye out over the next few weeks.

Christmas shut down 2013

Thursday, December 19th, 2013

V and F Sheet Metal Christmas Shut down

We will be closed for the Christmas break from Monday 23rd December 2013 and we will be back on Thursday 2nd January 2014.

We just want to say all our customers a big thank you for all the sheet metal projects that we have manufactured this year for your prototype and production sheet metal projects. Also, thanks to all our suppliers for your continued support throughout the year.

Let’s hope we are all as busy in 2014.

Stainless steel sheet metal fabrication

Wednesday, December 18th, 2013

Stainless steel fabrication

Here we have a typical stainless steel fabrication project manufactured in our factory at Fareham, Hampshire in December 2013. The blank parts for these boxes and covers were laser cut from 304 stainless steel using our brand new Trumpf 3030 fibre laser cutter and then bent up using a range of our CNC folding press brakes. The stainless inserts were then inserted in our Haeger inserter press and fly presses. All the welding was produced using our TiG welding facility. The boxes and covers were then sent for polishing to produce a perfect outside finish that was smooth and showed no sign of welding at the corners joints. All the welded plates had tags laser cut in position to line up with slots in their mating parts to make assembly easy for the welders and ensure all parts lined up correctly. These tags and slots can easily be inserted into the 3D model using our Radan sheet metal software. It’s nice to be able to show a project like this that encompasses so many different manufacturing processes and enables us to show off what we can do for our customers. The final completed box and cover will house a pump and control gear for the fuel delivery industry.

If you have a sheet metal fabrication project you want us to take a look at please just call or send an e-mail and we will be happy to help advise you or produce a quote.

Laser cutting sheet metal November 2013

Thursday, December 5th, 2013

Laser cutting bright annealed 304 stainless steel sheet metal with a Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser machine.

We are so pleased with the progress we have made so far in getting to grips with our new laser cutter. In a short space of time we have managed to laser cut mild steel, stainless steels, aluminium, copper and brass. We have learnt how to micro tag components into a sheet at the machine, use off cuts of material where possible, makes adjusts for the laser beam width and laser cut holes into steel tubes. We have learnt how to common line cut with our Radan software, tool complete nests and convert parts that had been CNC punched in the past to laser cut parts.

Our next challenge is to cut materials thicker than those that we are normally used to on our CNC punch presses so 6mm and upwards. We can already see in just a few weeks what a powerfully productive and versatile service this machine is allowing us to offer to our customers. Keep following us for more updates on the new uses we find to put our Trumpf laser to and the sheet metal work we produce with it.

Fast Tube by Casper

For more information on our new laser cutter please take a look at our laser cutting web page.

Laser cutting work examples

Tuesday, November 26th, 2013

Typical examples of sheet metal and plate cut with a Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser cutter

Whether it’s cutting 0.7mm thick mild steel with compressed air, 2mm stainless steel with nitrogen (clean cut), 5mm aluminum or 6mm brass the Trumpf 3030 fiber is the machine. Here are just a few examples of laser cut work to show off the accuracy and edge quality that can be achieved.

We are still exploring the range of materials that we can cut but after just 3 weeks we are amazed at the products we are already producing. We will be adding a gallery section to our website detailing more products that we have laser cut including mild steel, aluminium, stainless steel, zintec, galvanised steel and brass. It’s not just the advantages of being able to cut any shape without tooling and in thicknesses much thicker that that which can be CNC punched but the increased yield from the sheet metal, speed of CNC programming and the reduction or in some cases complete removal of any edge deburring that we know will be an advantage for our customers.

Please keep checking to see how we get on.

Sheet metal projects November 2013

Saturday, November 23rd, 2013

Just 3 examples of the hundreds of sheet metal projects we have been manufacturing this month in Fareham, Hampshire.

CNC punched pre-anodised aluminium reflector material

Lighting reflector CNC punched blanks

We have CNC punched out a range of small lighting reflectors from 0.4mm thick pre-anodised alanod reflector aluminium. The material comes with a peelable plastic film which we keep on the material throughout the manufacturing process to maintain a clean and scratch free surface on the presentation side of the material. With all reflector materials whether they are highly polished such as Miro4 or satin as this material they can show finger marks so easily so they have to be handled very carefully. The reflectors were CNC punched on our slower punch press, the Trumpf 200. This is perfect for this process as the material is so thin and delicate that the slower gentle punching suits the sheet metal nest once it has become fragile towards the end of the program. You can see that the material yield is good on the sheet whilst still maintaining a practical program in production.

Aluminium assemblies MiG welded together

Aluminium MiG welded chassis assemblies

Here we have manufactured a batch of aluminium chassis assemblies from 3mm 1050a aluminium alloy. The manufacturing techniques have included CNC punching, edge deburring, bush insertion, sheet rolling, CNC bending, aluminium MiG welding and cleaning up. These welded fabrications are then powder coated and used within the assembly of a scientific instrument.

Zintec chassis parts laser cut and CNC bent

Zintec folded sheet metal end plates

These Zintec (zinc coated mild steel) end plates have been manufactured using laser cutting and CNC bending techniques. These parts are among the first sheet metal components that we have manufactured on our new Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser machine. The parts were laser cut with compressed air as the assist gas which removed the need to deburr the cut edges that would have been done under CNC punching. The final finished parts were powder coated and then used in a pump assembly for the brewery industry.

Go an idea that you may want to have manufactured in sheet metal or need a bit of advice?

Give us a call or send an email and our engineering team will take a look for for you.

Laser cutting sheet metal work

Monday, November 18th, 2013

Laser cutting 2mm thick mild steel

We are really pleased to be able to show off our new Trumpf 3030 fiber laser cutter. This small part was cut using oxygen to produce a perfect edge cut around the internal holes and the outer profile. The parts were then folded, countersunk and barrel deburred before being zinc plated and colour passivated. The speed and edge quality we are getting is better than the CNC punching method we were using before and any laser cutting oxide surface is removed in the acid of the zinc plating process.

Fast Tube by Casper

If you have a laser cutting sheet metal project and want us to take a look at it for you please just ask, call us on 01489 577786 or email sales@vandf.co.uk

For more information on laser cutting with a Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser please follow the link to our plant web page.

Manufacturing sheet metal bent components

Thursday, November 14th, 2013

Aluminium lighting gear tray chassis

Aluminium lighting gear tray chassis

A batch of aluminium sheet metal gear trays used to enclosure electronic equipment on a LED light fitting. The blue colour is the protective peelable plastic film which is easily removed but left on during production to keep them as clean and scratch free as possible. The components are quite complex with a series of operations needed to manufacture them. Each component has been CNC punched and then had any sharpe edges de-burred off (using vertical de-burr belts) before starting any bending operations. The bending operations were carried out in stages on our Trumpf 7036 CNC press brakes with the hank bushes being inserted and then more bends to finish off the components. We manufacture components like this all the time in batches of just a few off right up to many thousands off. We can provide prototypes for new designs and are always happy to suggest design changes to help you save money in manufacturing. If you have a sheet metal component that you wish us to look at and provide you with a quotation please just call us on 01489 577786 or send us a drawing (PDF, DXF, SAT and STEP formats) by e-mail and our engineering team will take a look for you.

Mild steel chassis plates

Mild steel chassis plates

When producing a component like this bent mild steel chassis plate we have a series of decisions to make. Which CNC tooling are we going to us to CNC punch out the flat sheet metal blank in the first place. Take for instance the large circular hole, do we have a tool the right diameter to punch it in a single hit, do we have a banana tool with the right radius to punch it out or do we have to nibble it out. If we have to nibble it out do we send the blank down the chute in the machine or do we tag it in or punch it all to scrap. These decisions are made all the time by our estimating and CNC programming team to ensure you receive the cheapest component but to a quality level that you required for your finished design. Its the same with CNC bending, deciding which tooling to use and which machine to run you components in can have an impact on the corner radius size and speed that we can produce the components.

Luckily for you all these decisions are made by us to offer you the most efficient method of manufacturing your components and you needn’t worry about these yourself.

Mild steel enclosures

Mild steel enclosures

A wall of 0.9mm thick mild steel enclosures which have been bent up on our Edwards Pearson PR6 CNC press brake. Although we can fold sheet metal components up to 2.5M long on this press brake we often fold smaller components in this material gauge of much thicker, such as 6mm thick angle brackets. These particular bent components will have many different studs and bushes inserted into them and then have the corners all tack welded together before being powder coated.

Laser cutting now offered at V and F Sheet Metal

Monday, November 11th, 2013

Laser cutting sheet metal

V and F Sheet Metal are very proud and excited to announce that we now have a brand new laser cutting service in house here in Fareham, Hampshire. We are offering this service to our existing customers and for new work to enable us to offer a quicker lead time on parts and to improve part quality. Using a Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser we will be able to cut a range of materials including mild steel, stainless steel, zintec and galvanised coated steel, aluminium alloys, copper and brass. This investment in extended cutting ability and material thicknesses has been planned for a long time and has been enabled with the extra factory space we now have. Over the next few weeks we will be able to test out all the laser cutting features of our new machine and I will be posting examples of the work we are producing. Early tests show a perfect cut on thin gauges of metal even when using compressed air as the assist gas. We went for a fiber laser over a CO2 laser as it is cheaper to run and can cut quicker on thin sheet metal gauges (up to 4mm). The fibre laser can still cut up to 20mm thick but currently we will be limiting ourselves to thinner work while we get used to the machine.

Laser cutting examples

Here are some typical examples of laser cut sheet metal parts kindly supplied to us by Trumpf UK. You can see here how complex some geometries can be in a range of material thicknesses and yet they are cut with ease on the laser cutter. Using nitrogen, oxygen or compressed air we can cater for all material and offer parts priced according to suit their final use. More information will be posted to laser cutting gallery pages and a specific plant page on laser cutting over the following weeks as we build up a larger volume of work examples to demonstrate the machines cutting capability.

Laser cutting v CNC punching

Using laser cutting for some parts will enable us to remove the need for special tooling. This will be a great advantage for small volume items of prototypes. There will always be a place for CNC punching in our manufacturing plant with its ability to produce forms in components such as ventilation louvres, dimples, plunged hole. CNC punching is also very good at producing large volumes of holes with cluster tools very quickly. Basically we now have the best of both worlds with our Trumpf CNC punch presses and Trumpf laser cutter and look forward to offer a full range of services to our customers.

Laser cutting with a Trumpf 3030 Fiber

Thursday, November 7th, 2013

Laser cutting with a Trumpf 3030 Fiber

Laser cutting sheet metal profiles is so flexible with a Trumpf fiber laser cutting metal materials from the thinnest sheet up to 20mm thick mild steel. The picture here shows perfectly what we mean with the fiber laser cutting a thin gauge copper which is almost impossible on a CO2 laser cutter. Fitted with a load / unload pallet changing table the productivity of the machine is increased further making it a great production addition to our Fareham manufacturing factory sitting perfectly along side our Trumpf 200 and Trumpf 3000 CNC punch presses.

Why fiber not CO2 laser

If we were just cutting thick sheet and heavy plate all the time in our factory we would have chosen to use a CO2 laser cutting system but as we normally serve customers with thinner sheet metal components and a range of ferrous and non ferrous materials including copper and brass fiber was the obvious way for us to go. The fiber laser being quicker on thin gauges and cheaper to run will enable us to offer the greatest quality part at an economical price.

The fiber laser generator

The heart of the fiber laser is shown here and produces 3KW of power which travels down a fiber cable and directed onto the sheet metal through a nozzle and assisted by either nitrogen, oxygen or compressed air gasses. Not only is the fiber laser very flexible in the range of material types and thicknesses it can cut but its the fastest laser cutting method available for thin gauge sheet metal.

CNC bending sheet metal brackets with stiffening ribs

Monday, November 4th, 2013

CNC bending mild steel brackets

Trumpf 7036 CNC press brakes and tooling

Here’s a great example of a small mild steel bracket that I thought deserved a post of it’s own, so here it is. This little bracket has been CNC punched out, de-burred and folded into a top hat shape. The interesting detail is the stiffening ribs that have been added at the point of bending to increase the stiffness of the bracket. This type of design feature can improve the mechanical strength of the bracket without having to increase the material thickness which would have increased the weight of the bracket and its cost. These brackets are typical of the sheet metal work that we manufacture at V and F Sheet Metal on these CNC press brakes having a 35 ton down force and a 1M bed length. The Trumpf 7036 also has its own front table enabling our setters and operators to place work right next to the tooling area and sit at the machine providing a perfect ergonomic environment. This enables us to work quicker on component set ups and on long production runs helping to keeping the costs down per part enabling you to become more competitive. If you have a sheet metal bracket or other sheet metal component that perhaps needs bending or a stiffening rib when bending then please give us a call or e-mail your drawing for quoting and we can have a chat and see what we can do to help you.

CNC bending stiffening ribs

CNC tooling, flat sheet metal blanks and folded brackets

Typical set up of Trumpf style CNC press brake tool with the flat bracket blank and the finished mild steel bracket. Having no light guards but in line laser guards we are able to safely work very close to the top and bottom bend tooling, speeding up production and reducing stress on the operator.

CNC tooling layout

CNC press brake tooling set up

The stiffening rib is added to the bracket at the bending stage by separating the bottom bend blocks and inserting a metal strip in the gap which then forms a rib at the same time as the angle bend. This is a simple and quick set up enabling the rib to be added at the same time of the 90 degree bend which means it comes free, always good news for our customers.

Sheet metal tray

Saturday, November 2nd, 2013

3D computer model of sheet metal tray and cover

3D Radan model of sheet metal tray and cover

I have chosen to included an image on this particular post of a 3D model showing a tray and cover. The sheet metal parts modeled here were quite simple but nicely show how useful 3D software modelling can be in practice when making sure components will fit together and are the correct size for production. This tray and cover had fixing bushes and clearance screw holes that could be tested before sending for CNC punching saving us the risk of scrap metal and ensuring a good quality final product for our customer. You can also benefit from this service for no extra cost as this is part of our setting up procedure and is not charge to you on a production batch. For more information on Radan software please take a look at our web page or give our engineering team a call and we will be happy to help you.

CNC program of a sheet metal gear tray

CNC program with tooling on a gear tray

Once a component or set of components has been successfully 3D modeled they can be developed into a flat blank, this one show here has the CNC punch press tooling symbols in place. The software automatically assigns the correct tooling for hole sizes, cut outs and outer profiles according to rules we have set up to suit our standard tooling and machine limitations. The human element is often needed just to complete the job then the part is ready to be nested in a sheet and then CNC punched for real. You can see on this tray that the 16 cutouts in the were produced by nibbling out the shape with several hits of a smaller stand CNC tool that we had in stock. This is standard practice on sheet metal components making CNC punching such a versatile production process.

Sheet metal electronics gear tray

Sheet metal gear tray

Here is a finished aluminium sheet metal tray that has been CNC punched and CNC bent up. You can see rectangular cut outs in the base of the tray which have been CNC punched out in the same way that the tooled image above was created. You can also see slight white marks in the aluminium running along with the bends. These are from the bottom V block when the tray was being folded up. In this case it didn’t matter to the customer but if it is a problem for you then we can use a thick plastic film which will protect the sheet metal from marks on the bend block.

Preparation for laser cutting gas storage area

Monday, October 28th, 2013

Gas storage area prepared waiting for installation

Now the floor inside is ready to take our new Trumpf 3030 fibre laser cutter we have to prepare an area for the gas storage. These posts will act as a protective barrier to guard the cage that will hold Nitrogen and Oxygen bottles. Nitrogen and Oxygen are used as assist gases when cutting sheet metals and plate with a laser cutter.

Painting protective posts ready for gas installation

Initially we will start with gas bottle packs to see how much gas we use. Once we have a better idea we may transfer to bulk storage containers for liquid Nitrogen an Oxygen. Our Trumpf 3030 can also cut with compressed air giving us the greatest flexibility to select the right cutting method for you work at the most competitive price.

Floor almost ready for Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser

Friday, October 25th, 2013

Final floated floor now drying

The floor has now been floated nice and smooth and back up to the original level of the existing factory floor. The green look is only the final dampness coming out of the floor and will be gone within a few days.

Dry flooring waiting to be painted

Once the floor has completely dried out we will be ready for a sealing coat of paint. We are nearly there now and then it will be time for the arrival of the Trumpf 3030 3KW fiber laser, can’t wait.

New concrete flooring back in and ready for floating

Thursday, October 24th, 2013

Slowly getting there

Now finally we can see the concrete going back in. The concrete has been poured in and moved around to fill all the opening and reduce the chances of voids in the final floor. At this stage it is important to ensure all the reinforcing bars are encased in concrete to produce one solid floor that is locked into the existing factory floor area.

Top finish starting

Th new concrete floor has to be flat ready for the arrival of our new Trumpf 3030 laser cutter on 22nd October. The floor is rolled and then power floated to produce a smooth even surface in line with the existing factory floor.

Main concrete level now finished

The floor ready for power floating. Power floating can begin once it has dried out more and ready to walk on, now the wait begins.

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