Custom Roll Forming

Custom Roll Forming is the process of bending and shaping strip metal by passing it through a series of specially designed rolls. With over 75 years knowledge, experience and technical expertise of cold roll forming, voestalpine Metsec is ideally placed to help support our customers by offering tailored solutions to satisfy almost any requirement.

The roll forming process can not only manufacture typical shaped sections such as Channel, Angle, Boxes and Round tube but is also able to form more complex profiles required for demanding technical solutions. The ability to form complex shapes also gives the designer manufacturing options other than more traditional type processes such as press or press braking to form a product.

Custom Roll Forming at voestalpine Metsec provides bespoke standard metal profiles and special welded tubes in gauges from 0.5mm up to 6mm thick. These tailor-made profiles can be manufactured from steel, aluminium, copper, brass, stainless steel and even pre-painted material.

Another advantage of roll forming is that stress caused when bending materials too quickly can be avoided. From the initial roll tooling design the process undergoes a full Finite Element Analysis to ensure that the product is produced exactly to our customers design without inherent weaknesses. Overall the reduction of unwanted material stresses can be avoided by intelligent design and the gradual continuous forming process.

Through many years of experience we have designed our equipment to be innovative and adaptable. By offering further benefits to our customer such as in-line company logo embossing, printing, in-line piercing, in-line high frequency welding, saw and tool cut to length options, swaging and forming during the cut off process allows us to manufacture fully finished products without any additional secondary processing costs. For more information download our brochure located at the bottom of this page.

Key Benefits

Quality

First cold roll forming specialist to have Integrated Management System (IMS) certified to meet requirements of PAS 99:2012
Innovative FEA software allows more complex profiles to be designed
Projects assessed at every stage by certified quality engineers
State-of-the-art manufacturing equipment designed to offer additional customer benefits

Value

A fully inclusive service, including design, manufacture and assembly
Offers a range of additional services, removing the need to carry out any secondary processes (i.e.: drilling, welding or cutting)
Ensures no hidden fees with budget outlined in initial Design & Manufacturing Feasibility Assessment

Flexibility

Able to generate and develop bespoke profile concepts in collaboration with customers
Able to design bespoke press, roll and manipulation tooling using COPRA® and AutoCAD Inventor
Produces prototypes to support customers throughout the manufacturing process
Manufactures solutions for a range of applications from bridging to office furniture

Sustainability

Committed to undertaking activities in-line with environmental best practice and requirements of ISO 14001
Aims to provide products with the best added value and the lowest environmental impact
Producing products in accordance with BES 6001 using materials that have been responsibly sourced

From initial concept through to final approval, here’s an outline of our custom roll forming process:

Decoiling Metal strip passing through a decoiler. High quality metal strip – ranging from 0.5-6mm thick according to the customer specification – is loaded onto the decoiler and fed through the entry guide.

Pre-Piercing Metal strip being pre-pierced. The strip is fed through our pre-piercing machine where holes can be pierced as specified.

Roll Forming 1 Metal strip being fed through forming rolls. The strip is then fed through to the forming rolls, which gradually change the shape of the strip to generate the desired profile.

Roll Forming 2 Each roll performs only an incremental part of the bend. Each roll performs only an incremental part of the bend, until the desired cross-section profile is achieved.

Roll Forming 3 The profile gradually begins to take shape. Step by step, with every forming roll, the profile gradually begins to take shape, providing superb dimensional accuracy and a smooth finish.

Induction Welding 1 A closed profile approaches the induction welder. If a closed profile is required our induction welding process provides an almost flat weld seam with strength superior to the yield of the parent material. We then use eddy current testing to ensure weld integrity.

Induction Welding 2 The tube is sealed by the induction welder. The tube is sealed, generating a complete profile with a flat, almost invisible, seam and a weld strength superior to the yield of the parent material.

Flying Cut Off The flying cut off cuts the profile into individual lengths. The profile is then fed through to our flying saw, which cuts it into individual lengths. The individual profiles are then released and stacked together, ready for final packing and dispatch or to move on for secondary operations.