FEATURE ON BENDING & FORMING

Sharpe Products invests in electric tube bender

Wisconsin-based Sharpe Products, a North American specialist in custom tube and pipe bending and tube laser cutting, has invested in an all-electric Unison Breeze CNC tube bending machine: a 100 mm single-stack model. It will be the ninth Unison Breeze tube bender purchased by Sharpe Products since 2003, providing additional capacity when bending tubular components for the company’s customer base.

Sharpe Products and UK-based tube bending machinery manufacturer Unison Ltd have a long and proud history of working together. Sharpe’s president and CEO, Paul Krickeberg, was an early convert to the idea of all-electric tube bending and bought one of the very first British-built Unison Breeze machines in the United States.

“This latest Unison Breeze tube bending machine will help to support our ability to offer short lead times and consistent results; attributes that are essential to our customers,” he says. “We’ve worked with Unison for numerous years and look forward to leveraging the advantages of this next-generation machine at our plant.”

Stuart Singleton, VP of Unison Tube LLC, adds: “Equipped with the latest version of our Unibend control system, the new Breeze machine will deliver cycle time improvements in the region of 25% compared with earlier versions. It also incorporates innovative new teach routines and simulation features.”

Just like all Unison Breeze tube bending machines, the latest model offers rapid set-up, fast tooling changes, high power, rigid mechanical design and all-electric control for right-first-time repeat subcontract work, or immediately after producing a single trial part.

Other single-stack Unison Breeze machines operated by Sharpe Products include 80 mm and 100 mm variants. Sharpe also has 76, 80 and 130 mm multi-stack Breeze machines.

For further information www.unisonltd.com

LVD launches new line of panel benders

LVD has added panel benders to its portfolio of flexible solutions for sheet metal processing. The new product line encompasses a range of models, including high-speed panel bending systems. LVD launched the new line at the Blechexpo exhibition towards the end of 2023, with the unveiling of the PB 21/12 automatic panel bending machine.

The new panel benders expand LVD’s scope as a solutions provider, offering users a broad array of metal fabricating products from a single source. Panel bending machines can process large and complex geometries quickly and efficiently in medium to high volumes. For certain applications, panel bending is faster and more efficient than traditional die bending.

LVD says it panel benders are engineered as cost-effective machines that it can customise to help users expand capacity and performance. The servo-driven design requires minimal service and is nearly maintenance-free. A universal set of folding blades permits processes a wide range of profiles and bends. Users can form most profiles using a single set of tooling. LVD says the panel benders boast an output capacity that is two to three times that of comparable systems.

Panel bending technology is suitable for producing large electrical cabinets, panels and cabinet components, shelving, clean rooms, steel furniture, architectural building panels, photovoltaic components, trailer side panels, lighting, and other industrial equipment panels featuring complex geometries with radius bends, short side lengths and narrow profiles.

LVD will initially offer three panel bender models: PB 21/12, PB 25/12 and PB 32/12 to handle panel sizes up to 3200 x 1250 mm.

For further information www.lvdgroup.com

Investing £350,000 in technology of the future

Precision sheet metal manufacturer KMF Group has expanded its manufacturing capabilities by investing £350,000 in a Salvagnini panel folding machine to boost productivity and accommodate its growing customer base.

Moving forward, the automated Salvagnini P1 panel bender will streamline business operations at this progressive manufacturing business. According to KMF, the machine will give the company’s metal folding process improved programming efficiency to support the prototyping of large batch production and add rapid capacity for volume manufacturing. The newly installed P1 product will also act as an energy saver, with KMF expecting to see energy consumption decrease in comparison with previous machinery.

KMF commercial director Keith Nicholl says: “Engineering is one of the fastest developing industries in the world. It’s important that we move with the times by investing and creating new ways of working to stay ahead of the competition. Our customers will quickly see a benefit from this investment, with the equipment improving efficiencies and processes.”

The company has also invested £75,000 in a bead-blast system, effectively doubling KMF’s finishing process capacity. The design of the blast system offers improved infrastructure, enabling the company to increase the variety of products it manufactures.

There will be a multitude of business benefits from the bead-blast system investment. For instance, KMF will be able to increase extraction capacity, clean down faster and add semi-automation to recycling capabilities, as well as improve the working environment for process operators.

For further information www.kmf.co.uk

THS chooses Unison Breeze tube bender




Total Hydraulic Solutions Ltd (THS) of Rotorua, New Zealand, has purchased a new all-electric ‘Breeze’ 65 mm single-stack tube bending machine from UK-based Unison Ltd. THS modifies new excavators from global brands such as John Deere, Caterpillar, Hyundai and Kobelco to accept forestry harvesting equipment. The company also provides a wide range of maintenance and support services for users of hydraulic equipment.

Currently in transit to New Zealand, THS’s new Unison Breeze machine will manufacture small batch runs of heavy-gauge tubular components from either stainless steel, black schedule steel or carbon steel. It will replace an older hydraulic tube bender that has been in operation at the Rotorua site for several years.

While visiting Unison Ltd for factory acceptance testing of his company’s new Unison Breeze machine, joint owner of THS, Andy Bedford, said: “The obvious question people will ask is why we chose to travel halfway around the world to buy a new tube bender. The fact is, after considering machines from several manufacturers and dismissing those which failed to meet our exacting requirements for quality, reliability, repeatability and support, we were directed to the Unison website by a company we know and respect in Australia.”

He continues: “A conversation with Unison’s sales projects manager, Steve Chambers, then followed. Steve clearly understood our need for a robust single-stack machine that offered easy set-up, rapid programming and fast tooling changes.All of this is essential as, with small production runs, we typically need to change bend tooling up to 20 times a day. In our busy manufacturing facility, the near-silent operation of anall-electric machine was also highly appealing, while Unison’s intuitive Unibend CNC meant training future operators would be very straightforward.”
For further information www.unisonltd.com

BLM Group introduces VGPNext software




VGPNext is the new CADCAM programming software for BLM Group tube-bending and wire-bending machines that tackles the latest technological challenges. The software features a completely revamped graphical user interface, with a wealth of features just a click away, designed to make the operator’s job easier and machine programming more practical and simpler. VGPNext improves the synergy between machine and software by simplifying core functions for more user-friendly programming.

With VGPNext, users can identify the part program right away, simulate the job and start production in just a few clicks. It is possible to choose a program from the library using an archive containing images and technical data. The library collects all the programs on the server in one place, providing the convenience of preview images and numerous search filters to make this step even easier. Customised tags are assignable to the various part programs and users can filter searches by tag, section, material, date, machine and much more.

The Bimport module can call up a tube or multi-tube assembly in STEP or IGES formats in VGPNext to obtain theoretical co-ordinatesautomatically. This saves a lot of time and allows less experienced operators to become familiar with the program.

The entire programming flow is more user-friendly with the help of a ribbon bar that assists the operator by indicating missing steps, incorrectly entered data, default data and user-modified data. In this way, VGPNext considers all possible variables – including theoretical co-ordinates, springback, material elongation, bending feasibility and choice of tools – and indicates how to intervene. The operator can switch from one step to the next without losing valuable data.
For further information www.blmgroup.com