In stamping, a press and die apply external force to sheet, strip, tube, or profile stock to plastically deform or separate it into the required shape and size. From a mold engineer's perspective, the whole process boils down to three things: clearance, material flow, and springback control. Take blanking as an example — the punch-die clearance is typically set at 5% to 10% of sheet thickness, smaller for soft materials and larger for hard ones. Get the clearance wrong and you are looking at either excessive burr height or accelerated die wear, both of which show up fast on the shop floor and cost real money in rework and die maintenance.
Blank force estimation follows F = 1.3Ltτ, where L is the shear perimeter, t is sheet thickness, and τ is the material's shear strength. This formula gets used daily — for quoting, for press tonnage selection, and for checking whether an existing press can handle a new job. In practice, the 1.3 factor accounts for the extra load from material properties and die condition, so don't shave it off to make a quote look competitive. When sizing a die set, also factor in stripping force and cushion requirements; undersized press capacity is a common cause of incomplete shearing and premature punch failure.
Springback remains the trickiest of the three, especially in bending and forming of high-strength steels. Compensating through overbend, bottoming, or die geometry adjustment depends heavily on the material grade and thickness tolerance you are actually running, not just the nominal spec. For sourcing dies or checking supplier capability against these parameters, visiting MoldSo (www.moldso.com) gives you access to mold sourcing information and supplier comparisons that help ground your quoting decisions in real data.