Acquainting You with The Ins and Outs of Press Brake Operating

If you are a press brake operator, bending materials must be a daily task for you to indulge into. However, bending materials successfully asks for an extensive knowledge about the functioning of machines and what exactly would be your role when it comes to operating it. In case you do not know much about working with press brakes, this article is for you. Here’s what you should know.

Press Brakes and Their Types

Search for "Amada press brake for sale" and you will come across several different types of press brakes. Take a look at some of them along with their specifications.

Hydraulic Press Brakes

Operators have been using these type of brakes for several years and they are a perfect fit when it comes to working with heavy workloads. They are available in the sizes of between 100 to 300 tons range and 50 feet in length. If you want to bend thick materials, this is the ‘to-go’ brake type for you.

Electronic Press Brakes

These press brakes are one of the latest batches in Amada machine replacement parts and come with several striking features. As one doesn’t need hydraulic oil, you wouldn’t face any situations when there are leaks, sealing and other issues that you might have to fix otherwise.

The best part about these brakes is that they require lesser electricity as compared to regularly used hydraulic brakes. This is because the motors of these brakes do not run continuously. These machines are available in small sizes (below 50 tons). However, you can always find them up to 300 tons. Also, they work swiftly and with more precision as compared to Hydraulic brakes.

Things You Must Know About Using a Press Brake

Check Tooling Tolerance

It is very important to keep a check on press brake tooling and the tolerance ever time you select a dye and punch you want to use. Also, as an operator, you need to take care of the fact that the tooling matches the specifications that the manufacturer has provided you with and make modifications where needed.

The Bending Methods

Coining, Air Bending, and Bottom Bending are some of the majorly used press brake bending methods.

Coining

In this type of bending, the operator has to stamp the material between the punch and dye. When you give the needed amount of pressure, the punch tip penetrates into the material and dye starts to flow within it. The output obtained is accurate and asks for the utility of simple machines as compared to the other methods.

The only compromise here is that this kind of method asks for a large amount of tonnages which is above 50 tons/square inch. Also, the machines using this method ask for a lot of wear and tear and you would need a robust tool which curbs you from choosing different tooling options.

Air Bending

In this method, the material interacts only with the edge of the dye and the tip of the punch. In this method, the operator pushes the punch past the top of the dye to the V opening. During this process, it doesn’t touch the bottom of V. As the punch tip doesn’t get into the material, the size of the V opening of bottom dye controls the inner radius of the bend.

One of the major benefits of this method is that the operator can make up for the mistakes and modify the design. They just need to switch the bottom dye. In case you make use of an old model that works manually, don’t go with the air bend method. Using old machines means, you might end up making more errors and the precision is sure to go out of the window. It is better to get a new press brake. All you need to do is start looking for Amada press brake for sale and you will find the one that suits your need for sure.

Bottom Bending

In this method, the angle of the dye should match the angle of the workpiece. This asks for some degrees of adjustment so that there can be a spring back. One needs to place the material against the dye. Thereafter, the operator needs to force the radius of the punch in the material so that they can achieve the targeted angle.

Last, but not the least, they need to release and let the material release itself and spring back to come in contact with the dye once more. It is advisable to overbend the workpiece by certain degrees because if the coverage is high, there are chances of you damaging the tooling as well as the material.

If you are an operator, it is important for you to obtain all the training needed to operate the machines. So, before you start looking for Amada machine replacement parts, you must obtain a good experience with working and maintaining press brake machines.

Alternative Parts, Inc. is the manufacturer and distributor of replacement parts for Amada Machinery.