Development Trends and Key Technologies of Intelligent Hydraulic Presses

Intelligent hydraulic presses are high-end manufacturing equipment, mainly targeting the design, manufacturing, and use process of hydraulic presses. It uses advanced intelligent technologies such as information perception, decision-making and judgment, and safe execution to form a human-machine system composed of human experts and intelligent machines. Realize the best organization and optimal allocation of resources such as products, tools, environment and workers, and expand, extend and partially replace human physical and mental labor in the hydroforming manufacturing process. This article will introduce the development trends and key technologies of intelligent hydraulic presses.

Development Trend of Intelligent Hydraulic Presses

1. Intelligent. The slider motion curve can be optimized online according to different production processes and mold requirements (such as blanking, drawing, sheet extrusion, progressive die stamping, etc.). Special working characteristic curves can be designed to perform difficult and high-precision processing. Achieve “free movement” of the slider.
2. High efficiency. The number of slider strokes can be set within a wide range. The slider speed and stroke are easy to adjust. With the help of multi-station technology and automatic feeding technology, production efficiency is greatly improved.
3. High precision. Through servo control technology, hydraulic press movement can be precisely controlled. Generally, they are equipped with a slider displacement detection device. Any position of the slider can be accurately controlled. Slider motion characteristics can be optimized. When stretching, bending, and imprinting, the appropriate slider curve can reduce spring back and improve the accuracy of the parts.

4. Functional compounding. For new processes such as isothermal forging and superplastic forming, the slider and mold space are used to build a temperature-controlled heating environment. The forging, stamping process, and heat treatment process are combined to achieve multiple uses in one machine and ensure product quality.
5. Low noise. The intelligent hydraulic press simplifies the transmission system and reduces noise. Help reduce punching noise by setting a low-noise motion curve for the slider. Compared with traditional punching, the new two-step punching process can reduce noise by at least 10 dB.
6. High energy saving efficiency. The servo hydraulic press adopts direct transmission, which greatly reduces the transmission links, reduces the amount of lubrication, and has strong maintainability. After the slider stops, the motor stops and the energy consumption is significantly reduced.
7. Easy to operate. Monitor process operations and quality through modern software technology, and plan and optimize the entire manufacturing process on the computer. User use and operation are more intuitive.
Intelligent hydraulic presses have a wider range of uses than traditional hydraulic presses and have high added value. It can be used in precision forming processes such as metal plate stamping, isothermal forging, powder pressing, rubber vulcanization, fiberboard hot pressing, straightening, press fitting, injection molding, etc.

Key Technologies of Smart Hydraulic Presses

The main key technologies for the development of intelligent hydraulic presses are as follows:
1. The servo motor is used to directly drive the main oil pump of the hydraulic press. At present, there are still many technical difficulties in hydraulic pumps directly driven by high-power servo motors. The speed adjustment range of the hydraulic pump is required to be very large. The hydraulic pump can work normally even below 10 rpm. Generally, the minimum speed of the hydraulic pump is 600 rpm, which makes it difficult to achieve large-scale operation. Range speed regulation requirements.

2. High-power AC servo motor and drive control system. At present, switched reluctance motors (SMR) are mainly used, which have the advantages of simplicity and reliability, efficient four-quadrant operation in a wide range of speed and torque, fast response speed, and low cost. Its disadvantages are large torque fluctuations and large vibrations. The system has nonlinear characteristics, high control costs, and low power density. It is necessary to develop high-power AC servo motor control technology and related application technology.

3. Special control system. The closed-loop control technology of hydraulic press pressure and position is realized through changes in servo motor speed. Since most existing hydraulic presses are controlled by PLC, smart hydraulic presses use hydraulic pressure and speed closed-loop program control, which requires a large amount of calculation and is difficult to meet the needs of process flexibility. A dedicated control system using an industrial PC must be developed.

4. Energy recovery and energy management system. In order to reduce energy loss as much as possible, it is necessary to recover and reuse the potential energy caused by the weight of the slider and the energy generated by the pressure relief of the oil cylinder. In terms of energy management, since the instantaneous power is many times greater than the average power, energy deployment must be done in large intelligent hydraulic machines to avoid impact on the power grid.

5. Forming process optimization based on intelligent hydraulic press. The materials and shapes of parts are different, and their production processes are also different accordingly. The intelligent hydraulic press is optimized and combined with various forming processes, and only by understanding the best process path can it exert its superiority. Studying the forming mechanism of various forming processes and establishing optimized parameters suitable for the forming process is very important for improving product quality and production efficiency and reducing production costs.

6. Optimized design of the smart hydraulic press body. Compared with traditional hydraulic presses, intelligent hydraulic presses have the advantages of energy saving, noise reduction, multiple functions, etc., and their body design requires more factors to be considered. It mainly includes various possible thermal processing effects, extreme working conditions, working frequency, complexity of parts, etc.

The body design of the servo hydraulic press requires the formation of a design method and technical system under the constraints of the stiffness, strength, and dynamic performance of the forging machine tool.

7. Software serving the design and manufacturing of intelligent hydraulic presses. The design phase of the intelligent hydraulic press requires finite element and optimization software to perform multi-field coupling calculations to simulate the operation process of the thermal processing process and give users an intuitive experience. During operation, a powerful intelligent process database, expert library, remote fault diagnosis, and other software are needed to support online process calculations to achieve the best process. After operation, relevant manufacturing information and equipment operation information are collected in a timely manner to protect the normal operation of the equipment.

Currently, high-end manufacturing equipment and intelligent hydraulic presses have broad application prospects. Zhengxi is a professional hydraulic press equipment manufacturer in China, providing high-quality composite hydraulic presses, deep drawing hydraulic presses, forging hydraulic presses, and smart hydraulic presses. If you have any needs, please contact us.