Sheet Metal Slotted Bending

The Art And Science Of Bending Sheet Metal | Hackaday
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THE ART AND SCIENCE OF BENDING SHEET

METAL
by:
Moritz Walter
47 Comments

May 18, 2016
A motor mount. A sturdy enclosure. A 43.7° bracket. The average hack requires at
least one angled metal part, and the best tool to make one is still the good ol’ press
brake. Bending parts requires a few extra thoughts in the design and layout of the flat
patterns, so if you want to know about bend allowances, bend deduction and how to
bend accurate parts even without a press, read on.
BENDING METHODS
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cookies. Learn more
The most common bending methods, but surely not the only
OK
OK are air bending and bottoming. They can be done on
ones,
https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

the same press brake and usually don’t require more than 25
tons of pressure for general purpose workshop use. A press
brake also comes with a manual or CNC-controlled back
gauge that allows positioning the bend line accurately. Just
like all presses, press brakes are a bit deceptive about their
danger potential. They look calm and move slowly, but the
moment their force hits the material, things can happen very Press brake (source)
fast.
However, if you can’t get access to a press brake, you’re not completely out of luck. There are
slotting techniques, where the material is weakened at the bending line just enough to place a
nice bend into up to 1/4“ steel using nothing more than a bench vise.
Air bending
Air Bending uses a punch tool and an often V-shaped
bottom die. The profile of the punch defines the bend
radius while the stroke depth defines the bend angle. Since
the stroke depth is adjustable on the machine, air bending
lets you bend sheet material to an arbitrary angle without
replacing the die or punch tools. The opening of the bottom
die should be chosen adequately depending on the material
thickness and bend radius, and a good rule of thumb is 6 to
12 times the material thickness. Doing so will ensure good
results and a long tool life. However, you’ll quickly notice Air bending animation – (source)
that even professional workshops use their 3/4“ bottom die
for just about anything, so that’s that. After the punch is released, the material will spring back
a little, which must be compensated by overbending the material. Air bending is not great in
terms of angular accuracy but can accommodate different materials, material thicknesses and
bend angles without retooling.
Bottoming
Just like air bending, bottoming uses a punch and a V-
shaped bottom die. However, the punch will press the
material against the inner surfaces of the bottom die, so the
angle of the bottom tool defines the bend angle. Therefore,
the method requires separate bottom dies and retooling for
every bending angle as well as significantly more pressure.
However, it is more accurate and has less springback than

air bending. What you will usually find in a general purpose

workshop or makerspace is a brake press equipped with a
90° bottom die for bottoming, and for any bend angle Bottoming animation –
(edited, source)
smaller than 90° the same die will be used for air bending.
However, since bottoming involves greater forces, it is also
more important to use the right dies. A rule of thumb says that 8 times the material thickness
makes a good bottom die opening. However, since the geometrically correct opening also
depends on the bend radius, there are better ways to calculate the opening width.
Slotting
To define the bend region and reduce
the force required to bend a part out of
sheet metal down to something you can
handle without a brake press, slots can
be cut at the bending line to selectively
weaken the material. It is similar to kerf
bending, but less flimsy. Slotting is a
great technique to get custom metal
enclosures and frames for small robotic
projects and even large unloaded
Example for a manually bendable bracket by Crown
structures. However, since it obviously
International (image source)
weakens the material, it’s a no-no for
heavy load-bearing parts that rely on the structural integrity of the bend region. There are even
patented methods using certain slotting patterns, and even if the idea behind them is simple
enough, they can be quite ingenious.
BENDING GEOMETRY
Depending on the bending angle and radius, the material in the bend region deforms. To get the
final part dimensions we aim for, we have to take this into account beforehand. Most
professional CAD tools, such as Solidworks or Rhino, will do all the bending math for you, but
unfortunately, many other good tools, such as Fusion 360, OpenSCAD or FreeCAD require
you to get additional plugins, make use of online calculators , or do the math by hand.

Sheets
Let’s start by assuming you wanted to build a 90° bracket out of an infinitesimally thin sheet of
material, or to be practical, a piece of paper. Because it’s so thin, it actually does not contain
any material, so it will bend without material deformations. To make it even simpler, we
choose a bend radius of 0, which makes it a crease. In this theoretical case, the length L of the
strip we need to cut out will be the sum of the two sides of the bracket, A and B.
If we now add a bend radius, our bracket will not consist of two straight sides A and B
anymore, but by two shortened legs, which I will call a and b. The legs are connected by an arc
of length c. So far, so good.
Cuboids
To think about bending a sheet of metal that has appreciable thickness, focus on an imaginary
central sheet, the so-called neutral line or neutral axis, within the thickness. This neutral line
behaves just like the thin sheet above, remaining undeformed during bending. The only two
things we have to bear in mind mind are that the material thickness t offsets the bend radius r’
of the neutral line by half the material thickness, and our legs a and b get a bit shorter. Real-

world materials like steel and aluminum do not behave exactly like this central line, but the
concept of the neutral line is still useful to describe them.
Bend allowance and k-factor

As always, real-world materials do not behave as simply as our models. After the material has
taken on its new shape in between the hardened steel tools of the press, this central neutral line
will be pretty messed up by the interaction. We can’t really know the course of the neutral line
after the bend without a detailed and rather complex model of the material characteristics. To
make things easy, an imaginary neutral line based on a simplified approximation can be used to
predict the length of the flat pattern:
To do this, a correction factor, k, is introduced. The factor offsets the neutral line piece in the
bend region from its center path until it has the length of the corresponding region of the flat
pattern. The k-factor is empirically determined for a given material, material thickness, bend
radius, and bending method. It reflects all real but unknown distortions in the bend region.

Since the k-factor depends on several factors, tables of empirically determined k-factors for
given setups are used. Using the k-factor, we can now calculate the bend allowance „BA“,
which is the length of flat material that goes into the bend region. It’s simply the arc length of
the „imaginary“ neutral line piece, that has been offset by the k-factor:
Of course, the approximation is only as realistic as the k-factor used, and it makes sense to
keep your own table with k-values for the materials you intend to work with. However, the
following values are a good starting point:
“Rule of Thumb” k-factor table (source: Wikipedia)
Bend allowance of slotted bends

When slotting sheet metal at the bend axis, the material’s average density in the bend region is

decreased. There is no particular rule for how much the material should be weakened but as a
rule of thumb, a density of 20% for up to 1/8″ steel is a good choice. Going with 20% density,
the bridge width w is 1/4th of the slot length s as shown in the graphic below. For the bridge
width w, I suggest not going below 3/4th of the material thickness T.
Straight slots
When using straight slots, the bend region in the flat pattern will be as wide as the slot width d,
so for all practical purposes, the slot width is equal to the bend allowance in this case.
Depending on the desired bend radius, the slot width can be calculated:
However, the radius should not be too large, and as a rule

of thumb, it should be below 2/3rd of the material
thickness.
Engineering slots
Slots can be shaped in a way to control
the bend in a more predictable and
material-independent way. While
cutting non-straight slots into metal may
sound trivial, there are still lots of
patents in this field. For educational use
and DIY-projects, the related patents by
Industrial Origami Inc. may still be a
great resource. They contain a whole
“Smiley” shaped slot pattern (by Industrial Origami Inc. –
catalog of more intelligently engineered
patent source)
slot patterns, such as the smiley-shape,
the self-indexing hinge, a twisted hinge , and other origami-like methods .
Most of the patterns are designed in a way that allows the material to self-index against itself

after the bend has been made. For example, the diagonal bridges of the smiley pattern will
shorten as they are twisted by the bending, effectively pulling the two flat sides together edge-
to-edge, so there is practically no bend radius and no material dependent bend allowance to
account for. This method allows for very accurate bends with neglectable deformations and
remarkably strong parts. The formula for the outside setback can still be used, and since the
OSSB is purely geometrical, no k-factor tables are required.
Outside setback “OSSB”

To get our flat pattern length L, we have to know the length of our the straight legs, a and b. Of
course, if you design a part using CAD, you can just read the dimensions from your CAD tool.
However, in case you just have a technical drawing with only the essential dimensions – or a
sketch on a napkin – you’ll have to do that manually.
The difference between a side length (A or B) of a bend and its leg (a or b) is called the outside
setback or “OSSB”. So the leg’s lengths are defined as:
a = A – OSSB
b = B – OSSB
At this point, there are two different definitions of the side lengths A and B is commonly used,
and it depends on the bend angle. For bend angles smaller than 90°, they are usually defined as
the length from the apex to the edge, for bend angles larger than 90° they are usually measured
from the tangent of the bend to the edge. For a bend angle of 90°, those two are the same. In all
formulas and examples, degrees are used for the bend angle α.
OSSB for α < 90°

For a bend angle α smaller than 90°, and generally, when A and B are dimensioned from the
apex to the edge, the formula for the outside setback is always dependent on the bend angle:

OSSB for α >= 90°

For bend angles larger than 90°, and generally, when A and B are dimensioned from the
tangent of the bend to the edge, the outside setback is independent from the bend angle:
Freedom of choice
Unless you’re bound to a certain norm, you can still dimension A and B from the apex to the
edge and use the first formula, even if your bend angle larger than 90°, as long as it is smaller
than 180°. Still, for larger angles, this becomes highly impractical, given that the apex moves
far away from the bend.

FLAT PATTERN LENGTH

Finally, we can put everything together
and calculate the flat pattern length L
that we need to cut the metal to by
putting the pieces together:
Bend deduction “BD”

In practice, the flat pattern length is always shorter than the sum of A and B, so everything
above can be condensed in the difference between A + B and L, which is called the bend
deduction „BD“.
For α <= 90°


and for α >= 90°

DESIGN YOUR PART NOW

So, knowing the basics about bend allowances and bend deductions, you should be able to
build your own custom steel enclosure, robot frame or mounting bracket using a brake press or
the slotting method and a vise. And you don’t need to own a laser or plasma cutter to get
custom shapes out of stainless steel or aluminum. Local workshops and online services will
happily feed your design into their highly automated fabrication pipeline and even small
quantities can become affordable. To round this up, enjoy the following video introduction to
the press brake by Dan Gelbart:
Posted in Curated, Engineering, Featured, Original Art, Slider

Tagged bending, sheet metal
← HACKING R/C BRUSHLESS MOTOR CONTROLLERS FOR USE IN BIG

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47 THOUGHTS ON “THE ART AND SCIENCE

OF BENDING SHEET METAL”
Charles Veres says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:20 am
Please note that there is such a thing as a hand sheet metal brake. It is intermediate in size and cost between
the bench vice and the hydraulic brake.
Reply Report comment
Kratz says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:34 am
Yep, back in High School we had the hand brake, as well as a foot powered sheers (not sure if that is the
correct name).
Ren says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:47 am

Yeah, Horror Fright sells a couple of bench top ones.
Paul says:
May 18, 2016 at 8:09 am
My first thought: “bench vice” = some kind of dungeon furniture? :-)

(amusing, but I see wikipedia reports it’s a common-enough spelling for ‘vise’ in some places)
OnceOnFire says:
May 18, 2016 at 9:10 am
No No, a “Bench Vice” is when judges are your main source of kink. (no pun intended)
Doug says:
May 18, 2016 at 10:30 am
Yes Bench top and larger floor models the manually operated leaf brake is what’s going to be
found in smaller shops and hacker spaces. Tools that can be constructed shop crews. Not
saying that a press brake can’t be shop constructed. Just that the leaf brake can serve a shop
well where sheet metal bending isn’t an everyday job.
MrFluffy says:
May 18, 2016 at 11:04 pm
You can use a normal shop press with bending dies in it, its not as fast as a press brake but odds are you
only need one or two bends, not production quantity speeds. Someone demonstrating it in this video, you
can make a die that spans widthways for more capacity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=pKv_pD_oREk#t=122
There’s also bench shears, I have mine set up next to the bench vice, and it gets 10 times the
use of the powered treadle guillotine and bonus you can cut wide radius curves out too. You
can buy new, but if you pick a old one up and pay attention to the blade you can be ahead on
quality of build. Mine has a hole for shearing steel rods too, I’ve used it on M10 threadbar in the
past. Pretty good if you are constructing a shop extension for shearing the rebar for the floor.

Only downside it curves thin sections slightly due to the progressive shearing action but I just
push them flat again after theyre cut out.
No mention of metal forming lubricants in the above, I just use light oil on the sheet. Heavy if I
am tube bending but thats another subject.
Moritz Walter says:

May 19, 2016 at 3:55 am
That’s a really cool build, thanks for sharing this!
MrFluffy says:
May 19, 2016 at 4:54 am
To be clear its not my build, just a random video showing homemade pressbrake tooling in a shop
press I found.
Mike Massen says:

May 18, 2016 at 7:32 am
Yowsah ! Takes me back :-)
I used to be Engineering Manager of Pretron Electronics Pty Ltd in Osborne Park, Perth, Western
Australia circa 1984-7 supporting the Westralian Equipment Group Ptd Ltd’s HydraBend Press
Brakes & Hydracut Guillotines with Z80A/NSC-800 based X & Y axis sequencing controllers
(CNC) for their range of toggle & direct action metal benders. In respect of bending formulae, we
had all sorts of drama explaining/deriving variant “bend allowances” for different materials
whether sprung or cold formed ro the apprentices re metal deflections etc – with odd mixes too,
all great fun :-)
Each CNC held a calibration table (~4KBytes) of the (bottom) beam bend deflection per load – all
the way up from the smallest 40 Tonne toggle action 3 meter for local machine shops through to
a ~ 500 Tonne 5-6 meter unit for Queensland Rail Authority. We also made odd specials like a
200 Tonne 9meter for making conical light poles – that one in particular had a strange story as it
literally shot the operator with the sheared off cap screws when they tried to bend 35mm 1m plate
with 179 deg crease angles to make bomb casings for trials for the local Stirling Naval Base.
Hydraulics are fun, with a lot more fun adding electronic controls that can run logic scripts with all

the perturbations/fluid hammer & other side-effects of flinging a few 100 Kilo-Watts around willy
nilly. We also did brushed DC motor backgauge controls (the graphic on right) for shifting end
stops for benefit of workers to push the sheets against etc, along with Infra-Red intrusion
detection also Z80 based to ensure the poor slobs didnt lose an arm or even worse – fortunately
never on my watch !
Pretron & Westralian Equipment folded circa 1988, I bought their used HP 1631A/D at auction &
a few other bits. I still have the CNC (Dos based) Protel PCB layout pattern as well as all the
16/32 bit fixed point entire code base to manage the hydraulic actuator switch points to arrive at
depth penetrations down to 0.01mm resolution for angles from 179 to 80 deg or so, tool geometry
permitting. All old tech but, if need be very easy to restore to working units…
Nice article, great to see, thanks :-)
Dax says:
May 18, 2016 at 9:34 am
Your CV aside; do you still go around comment sections and forums doing that condescending asshole
thing where you quote other people and preface it with something like, “Person Name mumbled
incoherently” followed by the quotation?
bill says:
May 18, 2016 at 10:10 am
Odd response Dax. A great part of what I like about this site are personal reminiscences/comments/
insights such as Mike’s.
Dax says:
May 18, 2016 at 12:04 pm
Perhaps in moderation, and without the belittling attitudes that often come from Mike.
Elliot Williams says:

May 19, 2016 at 4:08 am
I didn’t catch even a whiff of condescension in that comment. Awesome real-life experience.

Woot!
Report comment
Kratz says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:32 am
This is taking me back to high school, the good old days of drafting classes and metal shop. I
remember having to draw up a square to circle adapter. Not sure if I remember how to do it.
PUNiSH3R says:
May 19, 2016 at 9:03 am
The technique used for manually drafting a square->circle widget is called a “development” or
patternmaking. Cool techniques that are still valid, even in CAD. The most practical and
comprehensive book I’ve seen on the topic was “Laying Out for Boiler Makers and Plate
Fabricators” which used to be available as a reprint from Lindsay Books.
Ren says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:48 am
Thanks for making the simple act of bending metal so complicated!

B^)
Paul says:
May 18, 2016 at 7:50 am
Quick and dirty easy bending 1/8″ aluminum: use a table saw to make a trench about halfway deep (~1/16th
in) through the material. Bend by hand. Done. Perfect looking bend outside, and if you got the depth
correct, there’s a perfect zero gap sharp 90 degree corner on the inside. Practice if that’s important. (yes,
you lose strength at the corner by removing the material. if that bothers you, pick a different way)

DV82XL says:
May 18, 2016 at 8:36 am
Notch-and-bend is a valid technique for producing nice outside edges, very often these are welded on the
inside seam to strengthen the joint, but it takes a fine hand, a chill block, and proper heat treatment to
stop cracking.
Erik says:
May 18, 2016 at 9:03 am
Lot of guys on off roading forums use this method for skid plates, as they often have welders but not a
press brake. They seem to call them “Whiskey Bends” if I remember right.
mime says:
May 19, 2016 at 9:41 am
I wanted to bend 4mm aluminium. The guy at the workshop said it was impossible even with
machinery, because it makes very nasty stretch marks in the outside of the bend. In the end I
drilled a line of holes with a drill bit that has a larger diameter than the sheet, and bent it by
hand. It looks fine to me. It does have holes now though, so not as neat as your method.
For your method, I wonder what the thickness of the trench has to be. At least the diameter of
the material?
Paul says:
May 19, 2016 at 10:00 am
For a battery box I recently made, the material is 0.125″ thick, and I used a plain old 1/8″ wide carbide
table saw blade, cutting a rectangular trench/groove to a depth of 1/16″ (after a couple of trials, this
depth worked best). It fit perfectly. So at least for plain old AL6061 and a rectangular trench, I’d say
start with a trench width equal to the material thickness, and half the depth. Tune as needed. With the
6061 I used I got a nice clean bend. I have no idea of the temper, but I was surprised at how strong
(hard to bend) it was compared to the softer alloys, and how cleanly it bent compared to the silicon
casting alloys (which generally crack or snap if you try this stunt).

Thinkerer says:
May 18, 2016 at 8:35 am
This is great background, espectially for production level work. For most of us garage-level tinkerers it
suffices to run a bit of scrap of proper thickness through the brake (or angle-iron + C-clamps) to figure the
offset for the design.
Make a dummy or be a dummy, right?
Elliot Williams says:

May 19, 2016 at 4:17 am
Right on.
But then, how do you think they come up with that “k” fudge-factor? Trying out the bends on a
bunch of different materials and writing down the results. In the end it’s all the same — you’re
either figuring it out yourself or taking somebody else’s word for it. :)
(I like the hands-on myself, but I can see not wanting to waste material in a professional
setting.)
zerg says:
May 18, 2016 at 8:55 am
This sort of article is exactly how not to teach it.
Here’s a tip for those that actually want to learn this craft and don’t have access to expensive
equipment. Get Dave Gingery’s two excellent booklets on sheet metal and how to make projects
with them with a minimum of tools.
Working Sheet Metal
and
Sheet Metal technology.
They can be had on Amazon and other places.

Doug says:
May 18, 2016 at 10:42 am
I have some of Gingery’s material, but wasn’t aware of those items , thanks for the tip. Can we
expect you to step up to the plate and create and post videos demonstrating. what Dave
teaches?
Drone says:
May 20, 2016 at 3:09 am
Also “Designing and Building the Sheet Metal Brake” by David J. Gingery. Gingery’s books are
at a Maker or Hobbyist level, but still useful.
Slartibart says:
May 18, 2016 at 8:56 am
Why not just hire a bender unit from Mom’s Robot Factory?
Hirudinea says:
May 18, 2016 at 12:57 pm
Those things will rob you blind!
Rich says:
May 18, 2016 at 11:12 am
I’m a hacker, I just whack it with a hammer till it looks about right. ;)
john roberts says:

May 18, 2016 at 11:43 am

this make you a qualified whacker ;)
Claire says:
August 15, 2016 at 2:13 am
Yeah, nothing can beat a hammer;)
Doug says:
May 18, 2016 at 11:27 am
Attempting to be an instructor can be entering frigid waters. thanks to the Hackaday staff for
braving those waters. I do some volunteer instruction in the real world. But it’s generally generally
long accepted electrical and electronic principals, where I can help the students prove their
validity, by using simple experiments and circuits where they can see and measure the results.
Slartibart says:
May 18, 2016 at 2:34 pm
There’s something seriously wrong with the crowd when providing instructions in sound
mechanical (& electrical & etc) principles is “entering frigid waters”.
mb says:
February 23, 2018 at 6:30 am
I think Doug was referring to the comments that are sometimes left on a post like this. You
know, the life-affirming ones about how “you suck” and “this is the wrong way to teach it” and
“who doesn’t already know this?”
Jason says:
May 18, 2016 at 12:30 pm

I like these sort of articles – they are concise introductions to useful skills that save hours if I
decide to try something new. I’m bookmarking them all. Thanks!
notarealemail says:
May 18, 2016 at 5:53 pm
Me too! It’s rare that something on HAD crosses over into my job. Bookmarked.
This was a great article; but plan ahead and have an experienced operator do most of the
work. Mistakes can happen and the dies WILL shatter if you exceed limits or they warp into
something unusable.
Wear safety glasses please. And some of the CNC controllers will drive you crazy!
P.S. Use setup pieces. It’s not going to be perfect the first time.
Whatnot says:
May 22, 2016 at 10:18 am
Saw this in a related video to the ones posted above, and it’s a rather interesting trick/design

Jeremy Halloway says:

May 22, 2017 at 4:03 am
This was an awesome with helpful content. I believe in professionals so this is a very useful article for
everyone. Thank you very much for sharing..
mb says:
February 23, 2018 at 7:37 am
It occurs to me that you might be able to create a bottoming press with an arbor press. And there
are a lot of instructables that show how to make a hand brake.
Bethany Birchridge says:

March 15, 2018 at 10:21 am
I like that this article mentioned that you should have the density be about 20% for optimal metal
bending results. my friend is working on a metal statues for art class. Currently she’s using
aluminum, but which metal would you recommend for easy bending?
abrogard says:
September 20, 2018 at 2:23 am
I am wanting to build myself a ‘hand brake’ or ‘manual leaf brake’ as mentioned above. The
traditional old thing. Very hard to get details on them. Everything is about press brakes, dies and
such.
Overjoyed to find this site and this thread.
I would like to bend light stuff – 1mm sheet, only about 1m wide. Two things I’d like to know: how
much force is the operator going to have to put into lifting the leaf? and: what forces will be
generated in the thing so’s I can know how heavy to build it, what steel to use, what hinges to
use.
I’ve only so far been able to find formula for press brakes which go something like: Tensile Yield
Strength x cross sectional area of bend x distance between posts on the die x a constant factor.
Which, the provider of one of those formulas and a table of calcs, said won’t work with a leaf
bender.

Physics forums, maths forums, it has them all beat or disinterested.
Can anyone help?
Andreas says:
March 15, 2019 at 4:42 am
I really like the way you make give a thorough overview to someone not knowledgeable without
going into too much detail. The only missing section is probably bending tools. I would like to
suggest you either complement this article by adding that bit or linking https://fractory.co/press-
brake-tooling/ this one to your article. Then you have it all covered.
aston says:
March 22, 2019 at 2:35 am
thanks for making it so complicated friends have struggled to can any one suggest some other
places for gcse
Millie Hue says:

April 2, 2019 at 4:47 pm
I like that you pointed out that there will be no deformations when bending a material that is too
thin. With that in mind, I will tell my brother to choose this kind of material now that he will be
needing it for his personal project. It is just the equipment he needs to have in his workshop
wherein he creates art or metal sculptures.
Artizono says:
April 11, 2019 at 7:06 am
regarding V grooving, it also has many advantages like getting good finishing, smaller radius of
the sheet.

Sandra Patterson says:

April 11, 2019 at 4:27 pm
I thought that it was very interesting when you mentioned that taking into account the fact that the
material will bend depending on the bending angle and radius. When I was in high school I took a
metalworking class, I was never really able to make a bent sheet very well. I see now that I must
have not taken into account the geometry of bending metal.
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The Art And Science Of Bending Sheet Metal | Hackaday

THE ART AND SCIENCE OF BENDING SHEET

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

air bending. What you will usually find in a general purpose

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

Bend allowance and k-factor

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

“Rule of Thumb” k-factor table (source: Wikipedia)

Bend allowance of slotted bends

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

However, the radius should not be too large, and as a rule

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

Outside setback “OSSB”

OSSB for α < 90°

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

OSSB for α >= 90°

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

FLAT PATTERN LENGTH

Bend deduction “BD”

For α <= 90°

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

and for α >= 90°

DESIGN YOUR PART NOW

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USING MISSILE TECH TO SEE LIKE PREDATOR →

47 THOUGHTS ON “THE ART AND SCIENCE

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https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

Yeah, Horror Fright sells a couple of bench top ones.

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My first thought: “bench vice” = some kind of dungeon furniture? :-)

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https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

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Moritz Walter says:

That’s a really cool build, thanks for sharing this!

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Mike Massen says:

Yowsah ! Takes me back :-)

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

Nice article, great to see, thanks :-)

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Elliot Williams says:

https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

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Thanks for making the simple act of bending metal so complicated!

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https://hackaday.com/2016/05/18/the-art-and-science-of-bending-sheet-metal/[1/15/2020 4:54:45 PM]

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