Equipment for Cutting & Shaping Aluminum

Shear

• A shear is a kind of press that cuts metal instead of bending it. Rather than pressing two surfaces together, two surfaces are pressed adjacent to one another like scissors or a paper cutter. The shear force cuts the metal. Some shears use parallel cutting edges, unlike scissors. Others employ the slicing action seen in scissors by using a slight angle in one of the cutting edges or an angle and a gentle radius. Because aluminum is a relatively soft metal, it lends itself well to shearing. However, the thickness is important because aluminum's properties can also be prone to tearing, so while sheet aluminum is well suited for shearing, thicker aluminum may not cut very cleanly in a shear. However, blades can be customized for aluminum.

Press

• A press is essentially a mechanical stamping device which forms a piece of metal by pressing between two inverse shapes. The shapes are sometimes called dies. Car fenders, for example, are usually shaped in a press or large stamping machine. Aluminum is pressed, just like other metals. Aluminum, however, can have greater memory than ferrous or steel alloys. A metal's memory is the degree to which it can be bent and still return to its original form. Most metals don't just have a memory-threshold, but unique memory characteristics. This has to be taken into consideration with aluminum and aluminum presses.

CNC Milling Machine Head

• High-production machine work is done primarily with CNC or computer numeric control machines. Though the CNC component is just a means of input control. The actual machines can vary -- with many of them used on aluminum. CNC milling machines are frequently used on aluminum to make a variety of complex shapes. The milling machine can use an ultra-hard cutting head -- often hardened with tungsten carbide or cobalt -- to replicate in aluminum a three-dimensional form stored in computer memory.

Metal Spinners

• Metal spinning isn't unique to aluminum, but aluminum is one of the few metals used in this unusual process. Metal spinning is used to make conical forms. The method is very similar to throwing a clay pot on a wheel. An aluminum blank is fixed to a spindle and spun. Two armatures then press against the spinning metal on either side of the blank, like a potter's fingers. The pressure of the combined armatures deforms the metal slightly, coaxing it into a shape. However, the shapes are limited to symmetrical shapes on a single axis.