50,000 Ton Press Anyone?

[Roberts210]

There is a MESTA 50,000 ton press in Cleveland. It was installed in the 1950's and in 2008 was rebuilt. Here's a great video on it. There's another 50,000 ton press in the U.S., but I don't know where it is.

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[ZRX61]

The other one is at Grafton, Massachusetts. AF Plant 63.

 

[Roberts210]

I knew someone here would know!

 

[cvairwerks]

There were actually 6 of them at one time if I remember correctly. The USAF ran a heavy press program right after WW2. There are a couple of documentaries on it. Reynolds used to have a really good video on the rebuild of their press, but I can’t find it online anymore.

 

[Mike Folks]

If you can find it,there's a video of Men siting inside a press, loading and unloading parts being bent,I believe in China.

 

[Chevy-SS]

Great video! Thanks for posting.

 

[McBrownie]

Thanks for posting this.

A little more info on the rebuild:

https://www.cleveland.com/business/2012/02/alcoas_50000-ton_ready_to_go_b.html

In my early days, I worked for a company with 900 ton presses and they were impressive in size and what they could do. Seem tiny now compared to this beast.

 

[Oldtuleguy]

Awesome video. Never would have guessed how important these are.

 

[Earp69]

Cool video thanks for sharing. My friend does subcontracting up there at Alcoa where this press is. He said they mainly forge the big aluminum ribs for airplanes now.

 

[WNYflyer]

Thanks for posting, MESTA made some big stuff back in the day.

 

[ZRX61]

There were actually 6 of them at one time if I remember correctly. The USAF ran a heavy press program right after WW2. There are a couple of documentaries on it. Reynolds used to have a really good video on the rebuild of their press, but I can’t find it online anymore.

Just the two 50k's, there were also two 35k's.

 

[Rileysan]

I guess I need to take photos of the presses at work, and post them here. We have two big presses at work - 1 being 500 ton, and the other 2000 ton. I service them both monthly.

 

[cvairwerks]

Found a list of them:

Two 50k forging presses
Two 35k forging presses
One 13.2k extrusion press
Two 12k extrusion presses
Trhee 8k extrusion presses

There were 7 more presses to be built, but were cancelled. Didn't find any reference to which type or size press they were to be.

On top of that we (the US) had two 16.5k ton forging presses removed from Germany at the end of the war.

An interesting item came out of the rebuild video, in that one of the bolster castings was cracked and had to be replaced. The replacement raw casting was somewhere around 285 tons......Then it had to be machined!


Riley: If the company will let you, it would be interesting. I have a friend that has a 900 ton in his personal shop....

 

[mike93lx]

That's cool, thanks for sharing.

We have a 6000 ton, 3000 ton and a a whole bunch smaller than that, ranging from 125 ton to 2000 ton.

 

[Roberts210]

I guess I need to take photos of the presses at work, and post them here. We have two big presses at work - 1 being 500 ton, and the other 2000 ton. I service them both monthly.

Riley, what do you do to service them?

 

[Rileysan]

Riley, what do you do to service them?

The monthly inspections are nothing more than checking for hydraulic leaks, checking the oil, grease a few fittings, and visually inspecting for cracks on the rams. OSHA also requires a yearly inspection that includes ultrasound tests of certain fasteners. We also change the oil once a year (300+ gallons on the 500t).

The final test is to operate the press(es) and verify they work as intended. I typically grab 4" square tubing that we have laying around in abundance (we use them in place of 4x4s to keep parts off the floor) and press it flat.

 

[FTG-05]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyman-Gordon_Grafton_Plant

 

[mike93lx]

here's a pic of the 6,000 ton in the plant I work at. It's used to make very large grinding wheels (60"+). nothing like a monster forging press, but still very large. I was told the foundation pit was nearly 40' deep

Made by Williams, White & Company

 

[Straightgrain]

Here's a photo of a 40,000 ton press at Shultz Steel in South Gate, Ca. It weighs over 5.2 million pounds.

 

[Roberts210]

I was just reading about Shultz steel a few days ago.

http://www.shultzsteel.com/Introduction/CompanyHistory.aspx

From the article: In 1981, Shultz Steel installed the first new heavy hammer (30,000 lbs.) built in the United States since 1950. The hammer first produced a multitude of titanium and specialty steel forgings for the F-18 C/D and DC-8 –70 Series. In 1984, Shultz Steel erected its first heavy hydraulic press (28,000-tons) suitable for large aircraft structural parts. This was the first large forging press ever built by an American-owned company with its own funds.

In January 2000, Shultz Steel installed the industry's largest all-forged hydraulic press (40,000 tons). The 28,000-ton and 40,000-ton presses are two of the newer large forging presses in the world.

 

[Straightgrain]

A friend of mine worked there years ago and gave me a tour of the plant.

 

[Roberts210]

Wow. I'd love to see the 40,000 OR the 50,000 in operation. Or even a video of it operating.

 

[LonestarLando]

Cool vid. Interesting history lesson there. Thanks for sharing.