Founded in 1999, Premier Products of Racine offers a full spectrum of custom metal fabrication services, including bending, forming, punching, rolling, shearing, as well as welding and assembly.
Our 210,000 square foot facility is fully equipped to tackle jobs ranging from single prototype pieces to high volume production runs. Quick-change tooling capabilities, along with highly automated robotic loaders and unloaders, allow us to rapidly produce parts from steel, stainless, aluminum, copper, and challenging high-strength alloys.
Our engineers are experts at design-for-manufacture techniques and are capable of working with all common CAD file formats. We have developed efficient processes for fabricating highly cosmetic parts as well as those that adhere to strict ANSI, ASTM, DOT, and Mil-Spec standards.
Our use of Ready Bend tooling, with its precise rotary forming function, enables us to manufacture parts with minimum tolerances of ±.010 inches, and tighter requirements are no problem. We also offer a long list of finishing options, including anodizing, plating, powder coating, and painting. Statistical process control techniques are employed to assure top quality and eliminate process waste.
We are greatly experienced serving the needs of customers in many industries, office furniture, appliance, telecommunication, and solar are among them—the list is much longer. We pride ourselves on fast turnarounds and fair pricing.
Contact us today to learn how our custom metal fabrication services can help you with your next project.
Case Studies
- Cosmetic Roll Forming of Stainless Steel Parts for the Appliance Industry
- Stainless Steel Fabrication of a Cosmetic Door Trim for the Consumer Appliance Industry
- Fabrication of Tube Burner for the Barbeque Industry
- Roll Formed Stainless Steel Tanker Truck Structural Beam
- Roll Formed Shelf Ladder for Appliance Industry
Benefits of Sheet Metal Fabrication
Sheet metal fabrication offers a number of benefits to industry professionals, including:
- Higher production efficiency and accuracy
- Greater product durability
- Broader customizability in regard to materials, thicknesses, and finishes
- Lower production costs
Achieving these manufacturing advantages, however, necessitates utilizing the correct fabrication processes for the desired product and production specifications.
7 Custom Sheet Metal Fabrication Processes to Get the Job Done
At Premier Products of Racine, we offer the following sheet metal fabrication services:
1. Assembly
Assembly refers to the process of gathering and joining individual components together to form a larger product or structure. Two of the techniques typically used to assemble sheet metal parts are:
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- Riveting. This forging process uses a rivet—a special type of fastener—to connect adjacent metal pieces.
- Spot welding. This assembly process applies heat and pressure to spots along the joining edge of two metal pieces to weld them together.
- Projection welding. This assembly process also applies heat and pressure, however, this method welds much thicker materials due to electrodes being capable of carrying more current than those in spot welding.
2. Bending
In bending operations, fabricators shape sheet metal by bending it over an axis rather than by adding or removing material. The process relies on the plasticity of base material to take various geometric forms without cracking or snapping. It can—in some instances—increase the strength and stiffness of the end product.
3. Edge Conditioning
Edge conditioning removes sharpness and imperfections—such as burrs—that occur along the edge of sheet metal after cutting operations to increase processing efficiency and operator safety. Different types of edge conditioning techniques create different edges, such as milled edges, slit edges, square edges, and more.
4. Forming
Forming is an umbrella term for the metalworking processes used to shape and reshape sheet metal without adding to or taking away from the metal. Forming processes include compressive forming techniques, such as extrusions or forging, or tensile forming techniques, such as stretching.
5. Punching
Punching operations use dies to punch out or remove excess material from a metal sheet. Fabricators can punch holes of almost any shape in rows, staggered formations, or other patterns.
6. Rolling
Rolling involves compressing sheet metal between two rollers to reduce and make uniform its thickness. Rolling operations fall into one of two categories based on the temperature of the material being rolled: hot rolling (above the recrystallization temperature) and cold rolling (below the recrystallization temperature).
7. Shearing
The process of shearing creates straight cuts across sheet metal. The force exerted by the blades during the cutting operations burrs and slightly deforms the edges of the workpiece.
Additional Capabilities
In addition to the above sheet metal fabrication services, we have robotic load and unload capabilities to increase the efficiency and accuracy of our blanking line.
For more information about our sheet metal fabrication capabilities, contact our experts today.
Materials for Sheet Metal Fabrication Operations
When planning a sheet metal fabrication project, choosing the right metal is just as important as choosing the right process. Some of the materials we accommodate in our operations include:
- Aluminum. Aluminum demonstrates high versatility and a good strength-to-weight ratio, qualities that make it suitable for use in a wide range of metal fabrication projects.
- Aluminized metal. Aluminized metal features a hot-dipped aluminum coating that enables products to exhibit characteristics of both the coating and base materials.
- Carbon steel. Carbon steel is durable, cost-effective, and highly recyclable.
- Cold-rolled steel. Cold-rolled steel is smooth, stiff, and strong, with a better visual appearance than hot-rolled steel.
- Copper. Copper is hygienic, non-magnetic, easy to work with, and visually appealing.
- Galvanized steel. Galvanized steel has a protective zinc coating that resists rust. Products made from the material typically require less maintenance and repair.
- Galvalume. Steel coated with galvalume exhibits greater resistance to corrosion and rust.
- High-strength steel. High-strength steel is strong, hard, and resistant to damage at low temperatures.
- Hot-rolled steel. Hot-rolled steel undergoes a process that corrects imperfections in the material grain, making it stronger than cold-rolled steel.
- Stainless steel. Stainless steel is a low-carbon steel alloy that contains chromium, a material that imparts protection against corrosion and stains.
- Titanium. Titanium is corrosion resistant and can be biocompatible. Medical grade titanium, such as Titanium 6Al4V and 6AL4V ELI, are used to create medical implants.
Finishes for Sheet Metal Fabrication Operations
In addition to our sheet metal fabrication capabilities, we offer finishing services to facilitate the delivery of complete parts and products. The finishes we can achieve are:
- Anodized: a decorative and corrosion-resistant finish achieved by applying an electrochemical process to the surface of aluminum or other metals
- Black oxide coating: a protective black iron oxide coating
- Bright annealed: a mirror-like finish achieved by heat-treating steel
- Chrome-plated: a finish that adds lubricity and wears resistance to metals
- Cosmetic brushed: a distinctive finished achieved by milling, brushing, and polishing sheet metal to customer specifications
- E-coating: a long-lasting finishing achieved by applying an electric current to bind the paint to the underlying metal surface
- Plating: a thin layer of metal added to the outer surface of an underlying workpiece
- Powder-coated: a coating produced through a dry-finishing process that binds a protective powder to the outer surface of a metal workpiece
- Pre-coated: a protective liquid, paste, or powder coating for sheet metal
- Pre-plated: a plated coated achieved before the workpiece is formed or machined into distinct products
- Zinc plated: a coating that protects items like fasteners, plates, and other small products meant for mildly corrosive environments
