Sheet Metal Parts Design Considerations

Because bends stretch the metal features must stand away from bends to avoid distortion.

Sheet metal parts design considerations.

Base flange to draw the base of the sheet metal component. Relief height is generally kept greater than two times of sheet thickness plus bend radius. Some of the commands that are available in cad software are as follows. Edge flange to draw flange with bend angles and flange length.

A 1 degree tolerance on all bend angles. Extrude hole size position guidelines creating an extruded hole using a punching process requires extreme pressure force. A useful convention is 4t four. Sheet metal enclosures are fabricated by cold forming where the metal is clamped and bent in machines called press brakes.

Bends in sheet metal are manufactured using sheet metal brakes. When designing parts for laser cutting one should not make holes smaller than the thickness of the material. Standard gauge thickness that can be chosen based on your application. Instead the corners are curved.

Sheet metal parts with a minimum of 0 9mm to 20mm in thickness can be manufactured. Different degrees of curvature can be achieved and it is described by a parameter called bend radius. Lofted bends to connect two. In low carbon steel sheet metal the minimum radius of a bend should be one half the material thickness or 0 80 mm 0 03 inch whichever is larger.

Bend relief is provided at the end of bending edge in sheet metal design to avoid any crack tearing in the corner. As a result metal typically cannot be formed into a true 90 degree corner. A press brake creates a bend.