Jump to content
I Forge Iron

frankyluckman

Members
  • Posts

    90
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by frankyluckman

  1. I have a thread about "Avian" the kinetic wing sculpture somewhere on here... Yes, it was one of my entry photos. They picked local designers to put together a room for the show as they needed to use work from the show is how I received highlight in the publication. Bigger congrats to to Shawn Lovell who made the cover "Woman of Steel"! A great article if you haven't seen it.

     

    awesome!!

  2. Just a heads up. I Totally approve of my tax dollars being spent on programs like this..

    “The Fifty”

    Approaching Alcoa’s 50,000-ton forging press feels a bit like approaching an alp: it starts out incomprehensibly huge and keeps getting incomprehensibly huger. From a distance, the thing dominates the horizon of the hangar-like Cleveland Works facility; as you get nearer, catching glimpses through forests of girders and around cliffs of firebrick, it begins to dominate the air above. But even as you stand at its foot, being told that the eight steel bolts anchoring it are 40 inches thick, calculating in your head that that makes them 10 feet around—even then it’s still a bit out of reach. Only when you climb it, peer down from its sixth-floor summit, and realize that the puny machine next to it is, in fact, its 35,000-ton brother—well, then you finally appreciate the size of the thing. It’s big.

    The Fifty, as it’s known in company shorthand, broke down three years ago, and there was talk of retiring it for good. Instead, it was overhauled and is scheduled to resume service early this year. One of the great machines of American industry has been reborn.

    A forging press is—begging the forgiveness of the engineering gods—essentially a waffle iron for metal. An ingot, usually heated to increase its malleability, is placed on the lower of a pair of dies. The upper die is then gradually forced down against the ingot, and the metal flows to fill both dies and form the intended shape. In this way, extremely complex structures can be created quickly and with minimal waste.

    What sets the Fifty apart is its extraordinary scale. Its 14 major structural components, cast in ductile iron, weigh as much as 250 tons each; those yard-thick steel bolts are also 78 feet long; all told, the machine weighs 16 million pounds, and when activated its eight main hydraulic cylinders deliver up to 50,000 tons of compressive force. If the logistics could somehow be worked out, the Fifty could bench-press the battleship Iowa, with 860 tons to spare.

    It is this power, combined with amazing precision—its tolerances are measured in thousandths of an inch—that gives the Fifty its far-reaching utility. It has made essential parts for industrial gas turbines, helicopters, and spacecraft. Every manned U.S. military aircraft now flying uses parts forged by the Fifty. So does every commercial aircraft made by Airbus and Boeing.

    The Fifty began its work in 1955, but its history goes back to 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles required Germany to relinquish some of its principal iron-producing regions but allowed it to keep its abundant magnesium reserves. Strong and lightweight, the metal also had one crucial drawback: it could not be worked by hammering, the way iron could. Smack iron, and it bends. Smack magnesium, and it cracks. So of necessity, German engineers developed a new technique for shaping the temperamental metal: press forging. Components made by German forges, using both magnesium and aluminum, helped build the Third Reich’s war machine. But at the end of that conflict, the Soviets took the most powerful forge home with them.

    Meanwhile, in the U.S., Rosie the Riveter was still piecing together components out of layers of heavy steel plate. Finding itself suddenly at a disadvantage to the Soviets, the U.S. government decided to do something frankly Soviet in nature: it ordered the construction of a series of massive forges and directed industry in their production and use. The now-forgotten Heavy Press Program, inaugurated in 1950 and completed in 1957, would ultimately result in 10 forges built with taxpayer dollars: four presses (including the Fifty) and six extruders—giant toothpaste tubes squeezing out long, complex metal structures such as wing ribs and missile bodies.

    At least eight of the forges are still working today. The Fifty will soon be supplying bulkheads for the Joint Strike Fighter, the U.S. military’s next-generation workhorse. Planned production of the plane extends to at least 2034, when the Fifty will be 79 years old. Alcoa expects it to keep working for at least 30 years beyond that.


    126105pv.jpg
    126109pv.jpg
    126108pv.jpg
    126107pv.jpg

  3. That's a pretty impressive machine. Is there a way you can work inside so you can shrink the edges so they end up straight up? The bottom die looks much thicker than a hammer like a Yoder.. That was a big part of my problem trying to do them cold on a forging hammer, Once I got to a certain point the opposite edge from where I was working was trying to hit the ram. Of course trying to stop that beat my hands up pretty well. I annealed them several times, they work hardened very quickly at which time they just stopped moving So the 1/8 stainless would be to heavy for a hammer like the Yoder? You might want to clamp the plate between 2 pieces of plate with holes in the center. That will help keep the edges flat. Doing it that way will mean you are not doing any raising, It will all be sinking.



    The shrinking dies work the inside and outside of the material at the same time. You would hold the bowl with the open end down. As you shrink the piece( you are only going to work the outer .750 of 1" of the bowl) you want to help it down by pushing against the lower die slightly. This in turn will make the overall opening smaller, and put your sides at 90 degrees. Which is what I think you are after. I would think you could get it to 90 in two passes.

    and yes 1/8 is to heavy for the Yoder.
  4. This Has to be said. I am pretty overwhelmed by some of your introspect and responses. I am involved with lots of different forms of metal working and fabrication. I have to honestly say that the blacksmith community has been hands down the most soulful and welcoming. Anyone I have reached out to for help has gone above and beyond. This is something I have never experienced in 30 years of metalwork. I just wanted to take a minute to express gratitude to Uri, Larry, Grant, Brian, David, and Dillon and everyone else on here for not judging me, and treating me like and equal. I feel like I have truly found a home in this community. If I can ever offer anything back please do not hesitate. Jesse James 1244362552_uxB2a-L.jpg


  5. Yes it, the hammer, will be fine, it is the constant pounding on the building that is the problem. From what I have seen of pictures around your shop you have a lot of brick and mortar and that can be shaken and stirred, it is not the hammer you need to worry about. Anything that can isolate transfer of the constant shaking from the hammer to building will be advantageous.



    This building was built in 1921 and was one of the only Downtown Long Beach buildings left standing after the 1933 Earthquake...I'm guessing it will be fine.......
×
×
  • Create New...