August 2021 Volume 3

EQUIPMENT & TECHNOLOGY

But probably evenmore critical to the success of today’s brass forging presses, is the ability to program several die cores, to move the metal throughout the cavity (or cavities), producing near net forgings without flash. Mechanical presses of the past simple waited for the

delivery of a hot billet and then smashed the part with the upper moving platen, producing the fried egg of surplus brass surrounding the forging. Here is the control page to program the side cores. In this case, five of them:

Multiple cores also allow us to design dies to produce multiple parts per cycle, up to 5,000 parts per hour. Here we see a four-up die for brass elbows: (image at right) This has always been an advantage of a screw press, but it does not allow side coring or the elimination of the flash. The hydraulic side- core press is very comfortable with lead free brass as well. Critical to the uptime efficiency of a brass forging press running ECO brass, or other lead-free alloys, is a programmable, repeatable, and reliable graphite lubrication delivery system. The Neotecman forging system employs a series of 20 servo- controlled linear motor injectors to control dosing to the precision of 1/100 of a second. The 20 injectors are controlled with independent servo control and because it is a servo control, each cycle is monitored to confirm lubrication compliance. This allows the programming of the appropriate amount of lubrication with each cycle. Historically, when working with lead-free alloys, operators over lubricate, wasting graphite oil and over cooling dies that lead to premature wear and shorter life.

FIA MAGAZINE | AUGUST 2021 11