A low cost retrofitting technique for mechanical presses

The mechanical press is a machine which applies forming force on materials, mainly on metals. A die is placed into the press to mold the material during the stamping process. The eccentric mechanical presses with driving crank has a simple operation, but the slide upstroke and down stroke speeds are fixes and determined by the impact reduced speed on the material (the blank). However, these machines can be retrofitted attaching a servo-drive and PID controls to improve productivity. The objective of this work is to present a hybrid drive approach for controlling and improving the press speed and the stroke rate for eccentric presses, but keeping a die impact reduced speed on the metal sheet. The cost for transforming into a hybrid servo-press is around 20% of a direct drive servo-press.