ABSTRACT

The government new investment policies attract many investors to establish

new firms and service sectors throughout the whole country. It is obvious that
this new establishing sectors may face different problems either technical or
administrative. The productivity of these firms depends on the problems that
they faced. One of the technical problem which we focused on this paper
project is the technical problem which directly influences the productivity of
the factories.
Among the new investment sectors, pipe bending machines are the one that
have different technical problems. As designers we are going to improve the
production rate and production technique for better working environment. So
we attempt to develop a new system which helps the factories.
In this project a sincere effort has been made to develop pipe bending
system for better economically benefit. Currently bending operation is
performed by using man power only and this affects the production rate.
Semi automatic pipe bending machine which is introduced in this project
paper has different techniques to complete its required functions successfully.
It uses an electrical motor as a power source and gear box to get the required
table rotation.
And also it uses a clutch and engaging and disengaging hydraulic
mechanisms to stop the rotation for loading and unloading the pipe.
Since the concept is new:

Since the concept is new:

Actual working condition of the pipe bending
machine
have been carefully studied
Experimental and observations which lead to
decisions
have been carefully studied
Different countries experiences have been
referred to answer the question about the necessity
of bending of pipes and tried to adapt to our countries
current situations.
Different components of machine have been
carefully designed
Auto CAD 2008 has been used for drafting and
modeling works.

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION TO THE PROJECT

1.1 INTRODUCTION
In our daily life there is a high demand of equipments such as
hospitals, bed frames, school chairs and house equipment like
tables and chairs. These equipments attract the investors to
invest in the production of those materials to fulfill the demand
of their customers.
The nearby firms need to produce mass production of bent tubes
or pipes for the construction of the materials which needs the
machines with high efficiency, capability and productivity.
The existing pipe bending machine at HIBRAT MACHINE TOOLS
COMPLEX is manually operated. The operator is the one who is
doing loading, unloading, adjusting and clamping processes that
can take more time and reduce the efficiency and productivity of
the machines.
This project is focused on designing the semi automatic pipe
bending machine to solve the above problems with the aim of
increasing efficiency, productivity and reducing the time.

1.2 BACKGROUND OF THE PROBLEM

The nearby pipe bending machines have different problems that
affect productivity. Some of these are low mass of production and
labor cost.
While bending process is taking place the operator spent the
time for loading, unloading and clamping which can reduce the
speed of production and increase the number of labors.

1.1

OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT

The main objective of this project is to solve those problems

arising from the current pipe bending machines by implementing
the new ways that will increase the productivity and the
efficiency of the machine and also decreasing the labor cost.
The new machine will have better specifications which will make
easy loading, unloading, and clamping by means of using
hydroelectric system.
The other advantage of this new machine is to minimize labor
effort and reducing the production time which leads to mass
production.

CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE SURVEY
2.1 INTODUCTION TO THE BENDING

Bending is a process by which a metal can be deformed

by plastically deforming the material and changing its shape.
The material is stressed beyond the yield strength but below the
ultimate tensile strength.
The root of this art goes back to the time where people
were using different types of forming like forging blacksmith
method. But nowadays the bending process takes on the
knowledge and modern technology.
Modern products are produced using knowledge of past and
present tools that makes the fabrication and construction of
components more easily and conveniently.
The current state of technology permits us to produce
in one step precisely and accurately the complex products.
The pipe bending manufacturing has increasingly advantages
compared to other bending processes because it is used in
varieties construction of equipments.

2.2 THEORY OF BENDING PROCESS

When the metal materials are bent in cold condition at first an
elastic shape alteration takes place which is replaced by a ductile shape
alteration from specific degree. If the reshaping capacity runs down, the
work piece breaks.
The elastic plastic behavior is reflected in the stress-strain diagram.
Before the yielding point, the sample is reshaped elastically as
soon as the load is relieved the body returns to its original shape. If the
applied load exceeds the elastic limit, the shape of the sample is
permanently deformed.
The alterations of shape occurring when metal pipes which are being bent
are mainly determined by the material specific parameters like modulus of
elasticity and yield stress.

Figure2.1 stress-strain diagram

2.2.1 SPRING BACK EFFECT

Because all materials have a finite modulus of
elasticity, plastic deformation is followed by elastic deformation
upon removal of the load.
In bending, this recovery is known as spring back.
All pipe bending processes will exhibit spring back
after a bend has been completed. The amount of spring back
depends on the bend angle, bend radius, material and wall
thickness.
As shown in figure (2), the final bend angle after spring back is
smaller and the final radius is
larger than before.

Figure2.2 spring back

There are three methods for eliminating the spring back.

By over bend
By stretch bending
By increasing temperature

2.3 METAL FORMING PROCESS

The major cold working processes or operations are basically
classified under the following:
1.Bending
2.Squeezing
3.Shearing
4.Drawing

2.4 BENDING
2. 4.1 BENDING TUBES AND PIPES
2. 4.2 BENDING SQUARE AND RECTANGULAR TUBES

2.5 TYPES OF BENDING METHODS

2. 5.1 ROTARY DRAW BENDING

2. 5.2 RING ROLL BENDING

2. 5.3 MANDREL BENDING

2. 5.4 RAM STYLE BENDING

2. 5.5 PRESS BENDING

2. 5.6 RING ROLL BENDIN

2. 5.7 COMPRESSION BEN

2. 6 BENDING PROCESS
2. 6.1 BENDING WITH MANDREL
1. Rigid type:

2. Flexible type:

Flexible type mandrel

ball mandrel

2. 6.2 Bending without mandrel or filler

2.7 TYPES OF BENDING MACHINES

1.Manual bending machine
2.Semi automatic bending machine
3.Automatic bending machine

2.8 FACTORS THAT INFLUENCES THE BENDING PROCESS

1.Wall thickness
2.Method of bending
3.Size of the material
4.Tooling
5.Internal & external lubricants

2.8.1 WALL THICKNESS

Fig. 2.11 mandrel requirement chart

2.8.2 METHOD OF BENDING

2.8.3 SIZE OF MATERIAL

Table2.1 Size of material and bend radius Relationship

2.8.4 TOOLING
The machine must be setup with a proper tool, which is based on design
condition, tooling that includes bend die, clamp block, follower or slider block,
mandrel & wiper die .
2.8.5 INTERNAL & EXTERNAL LUBRICANTS
Table 2.2 selection of tube bending lubricant

2.9 QUALITY OF BENT TUBES AND PIPES

The quality is characteristic that a product or service must have.
For example, product must be reliable and useable.
The most important qualities are the ones that customer want. The
product quality can be judged either by metrical or attributive
quality characteristics. If you look at bent pipe shape, you can
judge the product as good if neither collapses on the cross
section, cracks, wrinkles, bulges nor any similar faults can be
detected. Metric quality properties are being angle, straight
lengths, wall thickness, ovality or roughness of the surface.
Given tolerance ranges as a precondition allow separation of the
pipes in good products or rejects according to these properties.

2.10

FEASIBILITY STUDY
In order to know whether a proposed project is financially
feasible or not, a financial feasibility study needs to be conducted.
This project is going to know how pipe bending process affects the overall
production of pipe bending machine industries.
We have selected HIBRAT MACHINE TOOLS COMPLEX in Addis Ababa
because this factory is found nearby and is active in production.

As it has seen from the above table () the company pays an average of 50,400
birr per year to the labors and this figure does not include overtime bonuses.
From the above table there is one machine of pipe bending, in one shift there are
three labors; one is the operator and the others two which are helping the
operator.
In this factory the work hours are 15.
The tube or pipe has 6 meters long and is cut in equal 3 pieces by using circular
saw cutter. The process of grinding takes place for making smooth end of the
pipes therefore the tube is ready to be bent at any specific degree of angle.
This machine can bend 300 pieces per day.
The semi automatic pipe bending machine has high speed of production
compared to the existing machine and this speed gives increased high product
quantity by 100% so that the new machine can produce 600 pieces per day.

CHAPTER 3

TUBE BENDING PRINCIPLE

3.1 TUBE BENDING CALCULATIONS:

The yielded stress of C -30 is = 60% of ultimate stress

=60%X570=

4.2 FUNCTIONAL SPEED OF BENDING PROCESS

Us we have taken practically the data, the functional speed of the
bending process is 2 revolutions per minute. This data is closely
similar to the most of CNC pipe bending machines. Its bending
speed is 12 degree per seconds.