To date, forge shops usually do not work separately. Most often they are an integral part of any other large-scale production. For example, they are quite common in the field of engineering. In addition, they are divided into several types.
Land characteristic
The modern forge workshop is a combination of several sites. This includes production and support departments, storage facilities, as well as service and household areas.
Speaking about each separately, the production departments are the areas where the parts are prepared, as well as the premises where the forging hammers and presses, stamping hammers and other basic equipment for work are located. Auxiliary sites include workshops that repair major equipment. This also includes power plants, heating, laboratories, technical control of finished parts, etc.
In the warehouses of the forge shop usually store metal, billets, forgings, flashing, spare parts, etc.
Technological process
Today, the forge shop, like any other site in production, needs to develop a technological process for efficient operation. For workshops of this type, there is one main criterion by which the technological process of production is chosen. This criterion is the lowest cost of one ton of forgings, which in this case will fully correspond to the required quality. In second place when choosing the main production technology is the required amount of parts, as well as possible special requirements for the elements.
Most often, in the forge shop, the technological process is divided into the following stages:
- separation of the desired material into blanks of the required length;
- followed by heating the workpiece and its heat treatment;
- high pressure material processing to give it the desired shape;
- after this, separation processes always follow, after which finishing work is usually required to remove possible burrs and so on.
Material heating
During work in the forge shop, increased attention is paid to the process of heating the workpiece. For the successful completion of this stage, it is necessary to very accurately determine the thermal conductivity of the material. Thermal conductivity is understood as a process during which heat passes from the external walls of the workpiece inward. This parameter depends on the heat capacity and density of the metal. Therefore, the higher this indicator, the faster the heat will penetrate inside, which means that less time is required to warm up. In addition, the kind of metal, its chemical composition and the temperature with which it affects the workpiece affects thermal conductivity. It should be noted that most often at a temperature of 700-800 degrees Celsius the thermal conductivity coefficients of different steels are aligned.
Variety of workshop
Today there is a forge-and-press shop, which is designed to process already heated billets. There are two ways of influence - it is dynamic or static. If the dynamic processing option is used, then forging or stamping of the material is usually used, while for static work, pressing is used.
Work in the forging shop is carried out at the expense of only three types of equipment - hammers, stampings and presses. Material heating is usually carried out either in flame or in electric furnaces. It is worth noting that the work in such a workshop is quite complicated by the fact that in such rooms a heating microclimate is observed. For example, in the warm season, the temperature at the blacksmith's workplace can be about 8–10 degrees Celsius above the air temperature. All this should be taken into account when placing furnaces and hammers that create high thermal radiation.
Workshops in the field of mechanical engineering
The forge shop of an engineering plant can be divided into three types, depending on its purpose.
There are forging and stamping departments at engineering plants. In this case, the nature of the parts produced will correspond to the selected types of engineering. This may be the automotive industry, engine manufacturing and other types.
If we talk only about those types of workshops that can be located on the territory of a larger enterprise engaged in mechanical engineering, then there is another type - utility. They mainly serve for the manufacture of small forgings for the main production. They can be used to repair the factory equipment of the forge shop, to produce the right tool.
Large machine-building plants equip forging and stamping shops on their territory, as they can engage in the production of the necessary parts on a large scale. Ancillary species are usually found on the territory of medium or small plants.
What is cold forging
This technology is also used in blacksmithing. The main difference from the usual process is that there is no preliminary stage in which the workpiece is heated to the desired temperature. In this case, only local heating of those areas where it is necessary to make a bend is allowed. The basis of this method is the ductility of the metal.
Any metal has parameters such as tensile strength and bending strength. Using these features, it is possible to process metal without preheating it. It is worth mentioning that due to the lack of exposure to the workpiece high temperatures, the chemical composition of the steel does not change, and therefore, tempering, annealing and hardening may not be carried out.
How is forging by this method
For cold forging, three types of operations are usually used:
- pressing the workpiece using manual or mechanized equipment;
- embossing is one of several processes that relate to forging without preliminary heating, however, most often it is possible to apply ornament only to copper, as the metal is quite soft and pliable;
- The third processing option is bending, which is one of the main ones.
Pros and cons of using this method
Of the obvious advantages, the following should be highlighted:
- firstly, there is no need for preheating, which significantly reduces the cost of production, since there is no need to purchase and use heating devices;
- secondly, products are characterized by greater strength;
- thirdly, it is possible to adjust the part to the template with high accuracy;
- completely disappears or the need for additional refinement of the finished part is minimized;
- the finished product does not have residues of soot and other combustion products on the surface.
However, cold forging is not without drawbacks:
- much more effort is needed to achieve results than with hot pressing;
- it is impossible to work with durable metal, which is presented in the form of sheets or ingots;
- in some processing options, a huge amount of force will be required, which requires special equipment;
- Before work, thoroughly clean the surface.
As a result, we can say the following. Firstly, the equipment for the forge shop is hammers, presses and stampings. In addition, depending on the operation, a different optional device may be used. Secondly, the forge shop today is an integral part of a larger-scale production, rather than a separate structure.