Stamping

What is it?
Stamping (or punching) is a metalworking process used to create one or more cut-outs in various shapes, including holes, in sheet or strip metal, or a component.

How does it work?
Stamping and punching processes use dies. MD3 has its own tool shop and devises, designs and produces the required tooling for your product in-house. Tooling is made from steel to exact tolerances.

Tooling is mounted beneath a hydraulic press or a mechanical excenter press. It is set up extremely accurately ensuring that lower and upper dies are precision aligned. Sheet or strip metal, or the component, is placed between the dies. The press is closed and opened and the required metal-forming processing is then complete.

Differences exist between simple, single-stage stamping tools and complex, multi-stage stamping tools. A simple, single-stage tool is used for a single metal-forming step or process. The material or product is inserted and extracted by hand. With more complex, multi-stage stamping tools, two or more processing steps are carried out in sequence using the same tooling. These tools are also commonly referred to as follow-onbending or shearing tools. Each processing stage using this tool is referred to as a station. The material or product is shifted a step at a time from one station to the next. Once it has passed all stations, the product is finished.

Stamping tools are ideal for highly repetitive products or processes. Once tooling has been made, the costs associated with stamping/punching are low due to their extremely short cycle times

What does this process allow you to do?
Examples of stamping include assembly brackets, complex hole patterns in mounting plates or light fittings (in a single operation), gland nut holes in pipe-clamp ground sockets, decorative items (leaves) for fencing, spacers and mounting pins with internal or external screw threads in products

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