Rfq Die Maker

[drylander]

I am looking to plasma cut these parts out of stainless but I need to be able to cup the fingers. I am looking for a die that I can put in a press to do this. I've never had a die made so I am not sure how this process works. Can I get some rough dimensions to get a rough quote then send in the part to you?
Thanks

 

[steve323]

How many are you looking to build? If you want to build 10,000 of them, you might want a die that can bend all 15 fingers at once. If you only need 100 of them, you may be OK with a die that only bends a single finger.

Steve

 

[drylander]

How many are you looking to build? If you want to build 10,000 of them, you might want a die that can bend all 15 fingers at once. If you only need 100 of them, you may be OK with a die that only bends a single finger.

Steve

Probably 1k-2k. I'd prefer to bend all the fingers at once. Forgot to mention its 16 gauge stainless.

 

[JimDawson]

I can build that die for you, but I would rather teach you how to build it. From you introduction I see you have a Bridgeport so you have the tool to build the die. A rotary table would be helpful in this case, but not required. The shape is reasonably simple, and the draft angle is done with a tapered endmill.

What Steve said above is correct, but I'm guessing it would take at least a 100 ton press to do all 15 fingers at once. What kind of a press are you planning on using? A 20 ton hydraulic press would do them one at a time.

The die will consist of two parts: The punch and the die. Now all you need is method of holding the two parts in precise alignment, this is done with a die set. The die would be machined to fit the final profile that you want, the punch would be the same shape, but smaller to account for the material thickness.

The good news is that there are little ears sticking out just behind the bend, these can be used to keep the part from trying to squirt out when pressing. One thing to concider is the hard edge left by the plasma. This would dictate the use of D-2 tool steel for the die, it's high chrome content gives it pretty good abrasion resistance. It also is a bit of a pain to machine. A-2 tool steel would work for the punch. There is enough draft in the shape to keep it from sticking in the die, so a fancy ejector is proabaly not needed.

It looks like about 16 hours of labor, and about $400 in materials for a single station die. This is a rough guess, but a 15 station die would be in the $10,000 range.

 

[drylander]

Jim,
I'd love to know how to build a die myself, I just though it may be too over whelming/complicated but maybe not... I'll watch a few you tube videos and get a feel for the tooling required.

I only have a 50 ton press now, so I'd have to find a larger press or not cut all 15 at once.

Thanks for the info.

 

[JimDawson]

Jim,
I'd love to know how to build a die myself, I just though it may be too over whelming/complicated but maybe not... I'll watch a few you tube videos and get a feel for the tooling required.

I only have a 50 ton press now, so I'd have to find a larger press or not cut all 15 at once.

Thanks for the info.

There is no time like the present to learn a new trick or two. This is what your Bridgeport is designed to do, you just have to learn how to use its capabilities while increasing yours.

It's my pleasure to help out, that's what H-M is all about. Tool & Die work is one of the things that I am semi-retired from and I am trying to pass on what little knowledge I have to anyone that can use it.

I assume you have a hydraulic press, rather than a punch press or press break that would be ideal for this project. So I would buy a die set that is long enough to accommodate 15 stations. That way you can add stations one at a time and see how many you can do with what you have to work with. Using a hydraulic press is going to pretty much require the use of a 4 post, ball bearing dieset like below



The downside of this is that it's more difficult to get the work in and out. But there is really no option because the top tool is going to want to move toward you when pressing so the die set needs to resist that lateral load. You might be able to find a used dieset on ebay or somewhere. You're in the wrong part of the country to have too many old stamping shops around to find a used one locally. My favroite brand of diesets is Lempco http://www.jiscco.com/upload/product/Lempco_DieSets.pdf

 

[drylander]

Wow. Thanks for all the knowledge sharing. You are correct as I have a hydraulic press. But have been looking for a brake. Would I use a 4 post dieset in a brake also?

I'm guessing there are blanks or I buy the A2 and d2 steel to fit inside the die set?

How do I fixture the dies to the die set?

I would make 15 separate stations, one for each finger as opposed to 1 single 15 finger station?

I'm looking around now for 4 post diesets.

Thanks again

 

[JimDawson]

All great questions.

You could get away with a 2 post dieset in a press brake, the gibs on the machine help to hold things in alignment. The ideal press for this operation would be a punch press for a number of different reasons.

In this case punch and die blanks are not going to be available so you start with a block of tool steel and start carving away anything that doesn't look like the tool you want. I would make a test punch and die out of 4140 or something just to test and refine the shape. I wouldn't even even bother to heat treat the test tooling. It will last long enough for getting the shape correct. Much cheaper and easier to machine than tool steel. The real tools will have to be heat treated to about a RC60 or so. I looked up heat treaters in Wichita and found a couple that should be able to do it for you. With the aircraft industry there, you should have some good resources available.

The punch and die will be secured to the dieset with bolts and located in position with dowel pins. The normal way is to drill through the dieset and use socket head cap screws into threaded holes in the punch and die. Two bolts and 2 dowel pins per piece. Most used diesets look like swiss cheese.


Individual would be the best. What happens if you chip a punch or die? You don't want to have to replace all 15 stations. It looks like those points are on about 1 1/2 inch centers so that should give you plenty of room for bolting in individual pieces. The other advantage to using individual stations is that it will give you a chance to add punches up to the limit of your press. I really can't calculate what the tonnage per station would be. There is a little coining going on there so it's really hard to make an accurate guess.

 

[drylander]

Definitely makes sense to have 15 individuals for the reasons you mentioned. 2 post die sets are a lot more common from what I'm seeing and it does look tough to get parts in and out, especially if I am only stamping 8 then indexing over.

For this reason I'm looking for a press brake. Is there any reason an iron worker with press brake wouldn't work with a 2 post die?

Thanks for your help

 

[JimDawson]

In thinking about this a bit, in a press brake, you might not need a dieset at all. Just design the tooling to fit in the existing press brake tool holding system. My only concern is that in this operation there are some lataral forces involved so this might be an issue. This is why you want to build a test tool to see how the entire system reacts.

An ironworker press brake should work fine and give you the flexibility for a lot of other functions with the machine.
.
.