General advice on aluminum.
Determine natural bend of sheet aluminum.
Determine the thickness of your sheet.
Cut the section of metal out or otherwise prepare the metal to be bent by removing any burrs or sharp edges.
When bending aluminum know that the smaller your inside bend radius the larger the chance that cracking will occur in the part.
We will start by calculating the bend allowance.
90 degrees bend angle.
You will need to know your material thickness mt the bend angle b the inside radius ir and the k factor k.
Choose a bend radius that matches your minimum bend.
For most applications with stainless steel or aluminum you can get away with a zero radius bend on anything under 0 050 thick.
If you have any questions or want to discuss your design contact us.
If your sheet metal is too thick you may need special machinery like a brake or a torch to bend your sheet into the desired shape.
Also know that for the best results and fewer cracks on the outside of the bend the bend line should go across or diagonal to the material grain when and where possible.
Since commercial sheet metal bending can be done with less concern for stresses caused during forming operation the radius can be near zero for thin sheet metal.
In other words if you re bending 1 8 sheet use a tool with a 1 8 radius to form the inside of the bend.
Determine the angle at which you want to brake the metal and mark it on the protractor.
A cutout or the edge of your flange to your bend.
Bend allowance calculator the bend allowance and bend deduction are two measures that relate the bent length of a piece of sheet metal to the flat length.
The bend allowance formula takes into account the geometries of bending and the properties of your metal to determine the bend allowance.
Figure 2 illustrates the sheet that is bent with the bend angle of 90 degrees.
Determine your minimum bend by measuring the distance from your closest feature i e.
Cells on the right will output the desired values.
With this free online tool we quickly get the sheet metal bend deduction and therefore the sheet metal blank initial flat length from the finished part measurements.
The minimum bend radius data shown in these charts is measured to the inside of the bend.
You only have to insert interior angle flange lengths k factor inside radius and material thickness.
If you re bending 0 020 thick material use a 0 020 radius.
After bending the sheet we need to do some measurements as shown in figure 2.
The bend allowance describes the length of the neutral axis between the bend lines or in other words the arc length of the bend.
You can use a tape measure or ruler to measure the thickness of your sheet metal.
From there we can calculate the k factor and the bend deduction.
This measurement will be necessary for calculating your bend allowance.
