Wire-Drawing Machine
Wire-Drawing Machine
a machine for processing metals by drawing. The wire-drawing machine consists of a working member (the draw plate) and a drawing device, which pulls the metal to be worked through the draw plate. The wiredrawing machine is equipped with several auxiliary devices for mechanization and automation of production.
Depending on the principles of operation of the drawing device, wire-drawing machines are subdivided into machines with rectilinear motion of the metal and machines in which the metal is coiled (drum machines). The former are used mainly in the fabrication of rods and tubes; the latter, in the fabrication of wire and shaped profiles that are wound into coils. The rectilinear wire-drawing machines are classified as chain, hydraulic, cable, and continuous (or track-link) types depending on the mode of operation of the main power drive. The drawing force developed by wire-drawing machines ranges from 1 kilonewton to 2.5 meganewtons (100 kilograms-force to 250 tons-force). Drum-type wire-drawing machines include bull blocks (with a single driving drum), on which the metal is drawn through one draw plate, and multiple-drum machines (which have several drums), in which the metal is drawn simultaneously through several draw plates placed in a series. In multiple-drum machines, depending on design, the wire may or may not slide along the driving drum. Soviet drum-type wire-drawing machines have driving drums 150 to 2,800 mm in diameter.