When businesses want to create a new product, it can be a very long process. So when the time comes for them to finally make it, it’s important that they find the best way to go about it. If the product is very large and needs to be made with aluminum or any like material, then custom extrusion might be the best route.
Extrusion Process
To better understand the extrusion process, imagine you’re using an old Playdoh Fun Factory. You would load up the Playdoh and press it through the holes on the toy and then would get it back in that shape.
The extrusion process works very similarly to this, but on a much more complex level with a far more rigid medium. First, a die is loaded into the machine that will mold the material into the piece that is being created. Then the material – also known as a billet – is placed in an oven and preheated. Now you may think that this may cause the billet to change shape, but that isn’t the case – the temperature is only raised enough to softens the billet for the press, not enough to cause an overall loss of shape. It is then loaded into the machine and pushed into the die, which cuts the billet into the desired shape, leaving only the desired product emerging at the other end of the machine.
It almost seems too good to be true, but extrusion is an incredibly useful process in industrial machining. Using extrusion, the aluminum or other metal is easy re-formed into the new component. Part of this is simple physics – the metal, like any other object, will take the path of least resistance when it encounters a blockage, so when the billet is pressed into the die, the metal block naturally pushes through the hole unblocked by the bit and creates the new item. With the raised temperature making the metal more malleable, as well, the finished product soon emerges – a process that looks not all that dissimilar from the previously mentioned Playdoh.
As convenient as extrusion is, though, there are a number of factors that limit the extrusion process. There are restrictions on the sizes, as extrusion is not a good option for very large items. Extrusion is also less than ideal for particularly complex shapes – this is where CNC fabrication steps in. Lastly, using different alloys can also affect the process, as some blended metals cannot be sufficiently heated to work with extrusion without losing shape or requiring too high of a heat to work with the extrusion machinery.
Once the newly created item emerges from the extrusion press, the new item is moved along to a cooling table. When it finally cools to an ideal temperature, a stretcher is used to straighten the extrusion. This process also helps to fix any twists in the material that might have occurred during the process, and also hardens the product on a molecular level with these subtle changes in pressure and stress. Finally, finishing cuts are made where needed to divide the extruded product into individual sections that meet the project’s required specifications.
After these different cuts are completed, the new component or part is aged to help it reach its maximum strength. This is most often done artificially with an aging oven. When in the oven, the extrusion is put through a series of tests that will cause it to not only reach its maximum strength, but highest durability as well. This heat treatment accelerates the natural aging process, resulting in a stronger, more rigid final product.
Machining Services
Extruded items sometimes are finished after the oven aging process, though other products will require additional work before it can be put into use. At Fab Masters, we can finish your items for you with our professional machining services.
Precision Cutting
The extrusion can create the core shape that you need, but perhaps you need special cuts after product to ensure that the new product fits with your existing project or to join together to other components. Our custom fabricators can take the new item through our milling machines to add notches or other cuts to get your product the needed shaping to make it complete.
Need your cuts to be exact? We can take your measurements and make precision cuts into the finished product. Our manual, automatic and bundle cutting capabilities can cut to within 0.005 inches of exact on products as small as 1/16 inch or as long as 16 feet or more.
Tapping
Need some holes on the extrusion to connect other parts? Our tapping service can handle that. Adding holes cannot be done during extrusion, but using our CNC tapping equipment we can make precision cuts into any product. With this computer-aided tapping capability, we can make precision drilling, milling and tapping in a matter of seconds with incredible accuracy. Whether it’s a millimeter-sized hole or one several inches wide, we can make these additional finishing cuts and drills to complete your product.
Welding
Do you need to permanently fasten your extruded product to another component or add a secondary part to it to get the finished item? Our precision welders are highly certified – above and beyond the requirements set by the American Welding Society and even the U.S. Department of Defense standards – so you can rest assured that we can make your item complete. Whatever you need, just let us know and our team can make those finishing welds you need.
Assembly
Of course, extrusion often isn’t the end of the line – in fact, it’s often the start. If you need us to handle assembly of your extruded components with other component parts, we can do it. Whether you need nuts installed, other components joined to the extruded product, or additional welds and tapping finished, our team can handle your assembly in our Michigan facility before packaging and shipping the finalized piece directly to your job site for open-and-install simplicity.
Fab Masters specializes in custom aluminum extrusions and standard extrusion profiles. Our experienced machinists use the latest state-of-the-art technologies at our disposal to fill any order you have. For more information on our services or capabilities, call us toll-free today at 877-320-2280!