The Wallace Expanding Process

The art of stretch forming a sleeve of sheet metal into desired product shapes can be achieved, and in all cases the girth dimension is increased as the shaping is generated. Two basic types of expanded products to which this process can be applied are one-piece expansions and multiple-piece expansions.

Important incentives to improving technology in commercial metal shaping such as material savings, quality improvement, cost comparisons, and shaping stability are discussed. The author believes that the expanding process has an important place in the future production of major automotive components.