20th International Forgemasters Meeting - IFM 2017

A new type of stroke-limited forging drive system was developed by GFM for its radial forging machines. As opposed to eccentric shaft machines this new drive creates two strokes per shaft revolution. Hence the stroke rates are doubled and allow for distinctive higher throughput and tighter tolerances. A prototype with eight synchronously working tools was built in house for proving the concept and to run trials. The machine is designed and dedicated mainly for forging of thin walled tubes. The results reveal that the ratio of outer diameter to wall thickness may be heavily increased so that this eight tool forging machine will broaden the product range of seamless tubes that are covered by a machine size. The paper will present the various trials, its results and the consequences of process advancments based on this new machine concept for the forging market.