| Sheet metal fabricators deploy various techniques | | | | metal components to each other. This is often |
| and items of machinery to bend and shape metal into | | | | employed for metal roofing. Flanging will add a lip, or |
| the components it supplies to numerous other | | | | rim, enabling parts, for instance pipes, to be joined |
| industries, including the automotive, aircraft | | | | together. |
| manufacturing and white goods industries, to name | | | | There are technical terms to describe different |
| just a few. | | | | aspects of sheet metal fabrication, including 'Flow |
| There is a whole range of equipment used, from | | | | Forming', 'Spinning', 'Deep Drawing' and 'Marforming'. |
| simple hand-held tools, such as the tin snip, for | | | | Deep Drawing employs punches which apply pressure |
| manually cutting thin metal, to the computer | | | | to force metal down onto dies to produce certain |
| controlled hydraulic press brakes, which punch out | | | | shapes and forms. Marforming is a subset of Deep |
| components for the aerospace industry. Industry | | | | Drawing, and uses a combination of rubber pad |
| requires all kinds of hollow forms and complicated | | | | forming techniques with solid die techniques. It can be |
| sections crafted from sheet metal, and there is a | | | | used to produce components with sloping or vertical |
| well-oiled metal fabrication industry geared towards | | | | walls. This is one of many techniques which metal |
| supplying these needs. | | | | fabricators use to supply all the aluminum, brass, |
| The first step in transforming plain sheet metal into a | | | | copper and thin steel components that are required |
| finished article is cutting, or shearing. | | | | to keep the machinery of industry ticking over. |
| For light work there are hand-operated, scissor-like | | | | Most branches of industry have been transformed by |
| shears. For heavier gauge metals, there are powerful | | | | the revolution in computer technology, and metal |
| bench shears. | | | | sheet fabrication is no exception. Many of the |
| Shaping, including bending, folding, grooving, beading | | | | techniques discussed above depend heavily on |
| and crimping, is the next stage. This requires a | | | | computer control systems in their day-to-day |
| variety of presses and other tools and machinery. | | | | operation. Computers come into their own when you |
| Bending and folding are used to create angles and | | | | consider that much sheet metal manufacturing has to |
| sections in metal components. Embossing applies a | | | | meet extremely stringent precision requirements, |
| design to strengthen and embellish the partly-finished | | | | which are difficult to achieve using purely mechanical |
| component. Seaming is the process of joining sheet | | | | systems. |