Case: Housing for submersible pump
This case concerns a metal housing for submesible pumps. As the pump, is to be used in water, where corrosion happens faster, it is made of stainless steel.
How we manufacture the pump housing
The steel housing is manufactured through a combination of conventional deep-drawing and hydroforming. The housing is drawn to a height of 310 mm in multiple drawing steps.
The benefit of manufacturing the submersible pump using a cold manufacturing process such as deep-drawing and hydroforming is that it preserves more strength in the material, compared to hot forged or casted solutions, which creates small gas pockets in the material, that makes it porous and fragile.
Hydroforming
In a conventional deep-drawing there is direct contact between the pressing tool and the item. This means that the item is affected more at some points of the surface than on other points.
In hydroforming liquid ensures a more balanced allocation of pressure towards the surface of the item, making it a more gentle operation than traditional deep-drawing. The gentle processing allows for making deeper draws on thinner material without breaking or damaging the material.
This makes hydroforming suitable for manufacturing this submersible pump, as the wall thickness becomes thin because of the massive extrusion of the material.
