Bend Line Markers for Complex Parts

[jwmb224]

some complex sheet metal parts have no meaningful way to be formed with a traditional press brake and back gauge setup. the examples are virtually infinite, but let me point to transitions as a common one many people are likely to encounter. back gauging them is tedious at best since the part rises up more with each bend. here is what it appears as for the press brake operator:

it's basically a rounded piece of steel asking for a large amount of bends. pretty tough to just run through the machine.

If Inventor could automatically create a small "nick" at the end of each bend line, it would make the forming process quite easy. we've done hundreds of them that way, but we have to create the marks manually, which is time consuming. here is what a marked piece appears as to the operator:

forming this by hand without a back gauge takes a fraction of the amount of time it would take to mark them manually. but this is what the sketch for said look looks like:

(holes enlarged for visibility.) as you may imagine, these sketech, especially on larger transitions, are very time consuming. but please don't limit this feature to the transition feature; i merely used it as an example. there are virtually endless examples of where an automatic bend line marking feature would be a welcome addition to Inventor's ever growing arsenal of sheet metal prowess. keep up the good work.

Jared

[mikeh2]

Just throwing it out there and making the assumption these parts are a circular path, not a parabola, but could you do the unfold feature, create 1 notch and then do a polar array.  Then Re-Fold?

Regards

[jwmb224]

as i have stressed this would not be handy just for transitions, but for the entire sheet metal manufacturing process. bending errors on our floor have been reduced by almost 70% since we started giving the press brake operators a visual reference where the part is supposed to be hit. it's just that adding those 'nicks' manually is tedious.

Jared

[gregory_nickol]

If I'm understanding your example above correctly: it's essentially turning what would likely ideally be a continuous roll forming operation with a "rounded" output into a very close "flat-sided" approximation using a discrete number of shallow bends evenly spaced on the object, without actually taking the time to model it with X number of flanges at Y° each and cutting them as required.

So for a feature for this, we would need to be able to control things like min/max bend angle for each bend, or min/max number of bends to create the transition.

[jwmb224]

again, this feature should NOT be linked to the transition feature; instead, the sheet metal bend line itself. Whether that bend line originates from the flange, contour flange, bend, or fold feature should not matter. Press brake operators encounter hundreds, sometimes thousands of hits each day. That little nick gives them a visual confirmation that they're executing the correct function without the need to pick up an instrument.

[gregory_nickol]

Ohhh, I follow now. Having done a little bit of press brake work myself in the past, I definitely agree that the little nicks would be great indicators for an operator, whether or not you're using a back gauge. If you are using a back gauge and you aren't lined up it gives you an extra check to see that maybe you're running the wrong program, or have the part flipped over, etc. It'd be great to have a command to add those features to the part!

Maybe it could work sort of like the hole command, and let you chose from a couple preset shapes (triangle/semicircle/rectangle/etc.), set the dimension for them, and do a window or click selection on the visible bend lines.

[jwmb224]

yeah flipped parts are a bad one. i realize not every bend in the world can have this feature, so it obviously must be a switch. but i think it should be a "remember default" kind of situation.

[jbalsar]

Once we export the flat pattern we put a 3mm x 0.5mm cut on the fold line in AutoCAD. This can take hours on a large sheet metal project.

[EdvinTailwind]

Great idea!

Custom shapes and sizes would be great, like half-circle, triangle, square or rounded rectangle. 

[jwmb224]

it's been several years and still nothing on the horizon for this? solidworks has had it for a few releases now. i know the sheetmetal module has historically been a little less loved than the other modules, but i think this would be a game-changer.