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Handling of large-format sheets, panels and boards. The problem here is not the weight but the area: the material sags and the edge strikes. That is why it is gripped across the surface with suction beams, which must be sized for the worst surface that occurs.
A medium-format sheet measures 2500 by 1250 millimetres, a large-format sheet 3000 by 1500. Even at a few millimetres thickness one person can no longer move it in a controlled way – not because of the weight but because it sags, oscillates and strikes with its edge.
Sheet metal handling is therefore first a question of support. The sheet has to be held at enough points to stay flat and guided so that no edge swings freely.
The usual lifting attachment is the vacuum lifting beam: several suction cups on a frame, spread across the surface. It grips from above, needs no access to the edge and, with a suitable cup material, leaves no marks.
Magnets grip ferromagnetic sheets quickly and need no sealing surface, but are ruled out for stainless steel, aluminium and coated surfaces or call for special checks. Clamps hold the edge and suit the vertical handling of single sheets.
The holding force of a suction cup depends on its effective area, the vacuum level reached and the surface. Sizing is done for the least favourable sheet that occurs at the workstation – not for the clean sample part.
Most routes start at the stack. There, sheets stick together through oil film and trapped vacuum, and the second sheet comes along. Fanning magnets, separating air or lifting from one corner help. At the press brake, turning is added; at the laser, sorting the cut parts.
A hand-guided device makes loading and turning a one-person job. For pure loading and unloading at high volume, the automatic loading systems of the machine builders are the usual answer.
What Entracon offers here is on the matching page.
See what we offer| Principle | Suitable for | Limit |
|---|---|---|
| Vacuum (lifting beam) | airtight, flat surfaces of any material | oil, scale, porous or heavily textured surfaces |
| Magnet | ferromagnetic sheets | not for stainless steel or aluminium; thin sheets only with care |
| Clamp | single sheets, vertical transport | edge must be accessible and able to take the load |
With a vacuum beam on a hand-guided device, yes – picking up, tilting and loading then become a one-person task. By hand it cannot be done in a controlled way because of the area, even at low weight.
They seal, but friction drops markedly. In horizontal lifting this is usually uncritical; when tilting to vertical the sheet may slip. Cups with a profiled sealing lip exist for this, and the sizing has to take the oiled sheet into account explicitly.
That follows from weight, format and sheet thickness. The weight sets the suction area required; format and thickness set the spacing: the thinner the sheet, the closer the grip points have to be.
One short conversation usually settles more than three quotations. Call or write — you will reach an engineer directly.
Start typing – for example “balancer”, “SAP” or “pipe stress”.
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