Hydraulic Press: Force Machine

The hydraulic machine, one of man’s marvelous machines, utilizes the principle of fluid equilibrium. Blaise Pascal on his famous ‘Pascal Law’articulated that the pressure on confined liquid is equallytransferred throughout the confining chamber or vessel without lessening or diminishing the force. Water or any liquid, under great pressure, is the source of energy used on all hydraulic machines. One such machine is the hydraulic press.This force machine is easily identifiable due to its use of cylinders, hoses, pipes and other accoutrements, e.g., check valves. Invented by Joseph Bramah, the hydraulic or hydrostatic press is also called the Bramah press. The hydraulic press is practically an industrial machine commonly used in steel manufacturing plant or in factories that manufacturesteel or other metal components. Most are customarily designed to bend, straighten and mill metals that are used on almost every aspect of industry.

How Does It Work?

The hydraulic press is a conventional force machine which has two separate cylinders of different sizes with piston and actuator assembly, and is connected to each other by a series of hoses or pipes and valves to transfer the liquid or fluid from one cylinder to another. If a given force is exerted on the smaller cylinder to push the piston, the fluid contained between the two cylinder assemblies is transmitted to the larger cylinder. Because the pressure is the same all throughout the confined fluid, the resulting pressure forces the bigger and heavier piston to move.

Let’s Put It Simpler

To make it simpler, the amount of weight exerted on the smaller piston multiplied by the quotient of the areas of the piston heads in contact with fluid (bigger area/smaller area) is equal to the weight produced to move the larger piston. Say, for example, a weight of 100 kilograms, exerted on the piston with an area of 5 square inch, was transmitted by the fluid to the bigger piston with an area of 100 square inch, the resulting force that moved the bigger piston would be 2000 kilograms.

The Equation

The equation would be like this 100 x (100/5) = 2000. However the travel of the piston on the smaller cylinder would be greater than that on the larger cylinder. This is radically in conformity with the law of conservation of energy. The smaller piston with its actuator can move back and forth forcing the larger piston to move on the said direction. The use of a series of check valves enables adequatecontrol, brakes, or stops to the hydraulic machine.

With this working principle, the hydraulic press can exert forces several times higher than that of the incipient force initially exerted to enable it to work. As the second cylinder’s piston becomes bigger, a greaterweight or load could be carried or exerted. The same dynamic principle is used by the hydraulic jack. Although the hydrostatic press machinemostly uses downward movement, the hydraulic jack, on the contrary, use an upward motion to lift heavy things such as trucks and cars. In this case, a weak force applied to the smaller cylinder’s piston can produce a force several times stronger, and is capable of lifting or carryingmuch heavy loads.

These machines have become so vital to the mechanical and industrial sectors that furthertechnological developments on such machines are still continuously carried out.

Mr. Shah from Sukan Industrial Marketing love to write about Hydraulic system