Artec Engineering has over 60 year experience in producing spun hemispheres ranging from 50mm dia. up to 1200mm dia.
A hemisphere is a versatile part, that is used in a wide range of industries such as lighting to garden sculptures and can be manufactured in a wide of materials such as aluminium, stainless, mild steel and copper.
Each hemisphere starts with tooling, which will be a machined billet that will follow the profile of the hemisphere.
For the larger hemisphere, these are produced as a casting, which will then be machined.
All of the machined tooling is completed inn house by one of our expert tool makers.
Step 1 – Guilltoine / Circle Shear / Drilling Ctr. Hole
The 900mm dia. hemisphere is manufactured from 3.0mm copper.
This begins as a 2.5 x 1.25 meter sheet of material that is guillotined in two two equal parts.
To ensure that there is enough material to produce the hemisphere, the guillotined square is placed into a circle shear to cut a 1200 dia. round blank.
The blank needs to be central on the spinning lath, so an 8mm hole is drilled in the centre of the blank.
Step 2 – Spinning
The 900mm dia. hemisphere tool is lifted and located on to the semi-automatic hydraulic spinning lathe and then calibrated.
In the video below, you will see one of our expert metal spinners gradually apply pressure to the material using a wheel, which is controlled by levers.
This is highly skilled to apply the correct amount of pressure and at the correct angle to form the shape.
Step 3 – Cleaning
This hemisphere is going to undertake further work before is goes to its final location.
Therefore, this only require a gentle pass with a scotch brite pad to remove some of the spinning lines and ridges.
Get in touch
If you have a sample or high volume batch work that you are looking to have manufactured, then please get in touch today and see how Artec Engineering Precision Metal Spinners can assist you.
tom@artecengineering.co.uk
