ROBOFORMING: The Future of Metalworking? (I Had NO IDEA This Was Possible) - Smarter Every Day 290

There is so much happening in manufacturing that I am blown away by.

I understand the absolute minimum basics of forging, stamping, casting, and a few other processes, but this concept of slightly deforming a metal sheet by pushing with two (by the company's founders) end effectors without any mold and just using CNC robotic arms is amazing to watch. The process is referred to as incremental forming.

The amount of computing power required to do all of this is stunning to me.

I think manufacturing might be becoming more complicated over time...just maybe.

This second video is ninety-four minutes of behind the scenes footage that Destin edited down into the thirty minute video up top.

Properties and Grain Structure

Properties and Grain Structure: BBC 1973 Engineering Craft Studies

Yup, 1973...that means not only is the narration done with an English accent, it's also paced for a 1973 world meaning I ran the video at 1.5 speed to bring it up to a modern pacing.

The video shows the etching process for various metals then does it again after cold rolling the aluminum sample, then discussing how the material's properties (ductility, hardness, toughness) change.

The video then repeats things for heat treating after cold working the aluminium (sp?)...then various carbon steels being annealed, quenched, and tempered.

I absolutely love the hand-cranked tensile tester that we see at around 8:10 in the video.

It's a great video for showing the properties and crystal structures of aluminum (sp?) and steel and how the crystal structures coordinate to that.

Making aluminum pots

Making aluminum pots
by u/DukeOfBagels in Damnthatsinteresting

There are a million things I could probably say about safety regulations, but let's just focus on the remarkable malleability of aluminum and enjoy the processing.

Apple Watch (various materials)

That is a straight up gorgeous piece of film making and advertising.

The sights of the aluminum being forged, poured, machined, anodized, and finished are absolutely stunning. Go watch it again before you start looking at the science of what's happening.

We get the full gamut of processing (forging, machining) and materials (metals, alloys, ceramic - zirconia - beads for the finish).

Beautiful...

And that doesn't even being to touch on the gold and steel videos that I'm putting after the jump.

All of these are available on Apple's watch craftsmanship webpage along with text and photos of the zirconia chosen for the crystal covers, the ion-x glass for the Sport face (potassium ion soaked to increase strength), or the sapphire facing for the Watch and Watch Edition editions (that sounds incredibly stupid to read).

There is also a webpage from Atomic Delights (a blog with sadly only three posts in two years - better quality than quantity, I guess) that does a far better job breaking down the three videos and speculating on some of the science therein than I ever could.