Sheet Metal Mechanic

Sheet Metal Mechanic is a quick and easy bend deduction calculator.

Sheet Metal Mechanic (SMM) is a quick and easy reference for calculating bend deduction for an accurate sheet metal bend. SMM utilizes metal thickness, inside radius, and angle in degree to determine bend deduction. Calculate a simple bend deduction or use the angle bend activity which takes each leg of the angle, metal thickness, inside radius, and angle of bend to calculate a flat pattern blank and bend line.

Sheet Metal Mechanic includes a simple bend deduction calculator using metal thickness, radius, and angle. The angle bend calculator uses metal thickness, radius, bend angle, leg A and leg B to calculate a flat metal blank. It also provides the recommended minimum cold bend radius for aluminum alloys to help you get the tightest bends without cracking material. SMM also saves your calculation in a storable list for quick future reference.

The heart of Sheet Metal Mechanic is the Empirical formula that calculates bend allowance, which does not need k factor. The bend allowance is then used to calculate bend deduction. Empirical means by trial and error which is how this formula was discovered.

This is an application I created to help me with my day to day tasks as a sheet metal fabricator bending thin aluminum piece part on a hydraulic punch die press brake. SMM is a work in progress, one of my future planned improvements include calculating a bend allowance for a sheet metal blank, and a site line for use with a leaf bending brake.