Metal Spinning and metal flow forming: current technology used on spun metal
These metal spinning processes became established in the 1950's with the development of efficient metal spinning machines. Before that, manual metal spinning was used, using machines similar to a turning lathe. At that time, the distinction between metal spinning and metal flow forming had not been made. Metal flow forming in today’s sense became possible with the arrival of high powered and automatic machining. Thereafter, dedicated machines were designed for each metal spinning process.
Modern spun metal and metal flow forming machines optimise all metal processing elements: slide movements, number of rollers, power used and rate.
The machine controls of course have seen technological advances too. Early days would see metal spinners moving the metal spinning tool purely by hand. The metal spinners would apply whatever movements required in order to influence the behaviour of the metal. The only limitation was the physical power of the metal spinners strength. The first high-performance metal spinning machines for volume production worked purely on the basis of copying a template, but with a restricted movement range. The complexity of the spun metal operation and the demands placed upon the metal spinners has resulted in further development of control systems, allowing intricate skills to be directly used by metal spinners.
The above developments have resulted in an 'instant playback control system' which has now become the industry standard in combination with CNC metal workings.
With the assistance of the latest control systems, the ability to work with the widest possible range of materials can be explored fully. Only with these systems has it become possible to produce an increased variation of component configurations and thus, significantly increase the possible metal spinnings and shapes which can be produced.
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