This week, AutoForm Engineering GmbH announced that it will offer its EasyBlank software in the cloud. AutoForm serves sheet metal forming and die-making industries along the entire process chain, and it’s part of a trend towards moving engineering software to the cloud.
Autodesk jumped in early after examining Adobe’s model in 2014, Onshape became the world’s first fully cloud-based CAD software in 2015, and we’re seeing more companies leverage the cloud-based subscriptions to sell and update their software automatically.
Who It Is For
The EasyBlank software is different from Onshape or Fusion 360 because it is targeted for a very specific crowd. It is only for material cost estimators, tool and die designers and sheet metal part designers. The EasyBlank Cloud Service serves small to medium sheet metal stamping businesses.
Cost
Free.
How It Works
The EasyBlank Cloud Service won’t hurt your wallet, and it is a purely web-based application (like Onshape and not like Fusion 360, for example) that can be accessed through a browser without having to install any piece of software.
The way it works is by creating a blank outline of CAD part geometry through its simulation technology, with the results appearing in your browser in IGS CAD file format along with a comprehensive Excel format.
There are a few distinct types of nesting layouts users choose from, depending on their needs. Parameters for the most universally used materials in stamping are already integrated in EasyBlank.
Using EasyBlank to Assess Product Feasibility
Automatic Excel-Based Reports
Results of part analysis contain precise data on the blank outline, material consumption and costs, optimal nesting layout, feasibility plot, the thinning distribution of the part and the associated Forming Limit Diagram.
Users can enable these reports to be generated automatically—helping improve communication between internal departments as well as suppliers and original equipment manufacturers.
AutoForm has a decent-sized software portfolio that includes things like AutoForm-StampingAdviserplus, which helps increase the reliability and accuracy of feasibility results by taking forming conditions like material properties and restraining forces into account.