Educate me on modern press brakes.

I have the opportunity to buy a late 80s promecam 6 ft 88 tonup acting brake for what seems like a really good price.
My experience with brakes is all with an old Chicago mechanical that uses American planer tooling. We brake to a soapstone line or use angle clamped for a back gage. Most of my bending is 12 ga, with some 10ga also.
The promecam is not under power, the seller assures me it was working. It has a Hurco autobend 7 control. Looks like the back gage only goes back and forth, up and down has handwheels, so that's manual.
My biggest question is can I use my American tooling to get started? Also what if the controller shits the bed? Can I still use the brake manually? Like I said this is fab shop work, not precision. Im open to investing in better tooling down the road, but would like to get by with what I have for now, as we just bought an ironworker, larger lathe, and If I buy this money will be tight for a few months.

I have a 1984 Amada Promecam with NC-9ex controller. We can run the machine in manual mode, you just have to set the depth manually and then cobble up a back stop. We had a servo board go out and while it was down we continued making parts in manual mode, very happy to have the controller back though. You can use American tooling with adapters for the dies and punches (pricey adaptors, I would price them before buying the machine).

I have about that same machine, still very short on tooling. Whats really good price? I paid about $5,000 for mine, no tooling. The Autobend 7 should also control punch stroke so you can make less than full bends. Its a heavy girl, think price in terms of installed and running, not just purchase of a pig in a poke. If it works good, IMO you would be better off to buy the European style tooling you need rather than an adapter.

I have an upacting Adira with a Hurco Autobend 7 until the buyer picks it up.

It's what I would consider to be the simplest you could make a CNC brake without sacrificing usability.

Ours has flip fingers. If yours doesn't have flip fingers you need to make some. Super useful.

The retract function is pointless with flip fingers, but is very difficult to set just right.

If it has tool holders that can hold American tooling, no problem. You can flip gooseneck American tooling, but not European tooling.


I will say we had (repairable) issues with our Controller. Hurco is still around and you can call them. We had a bad connection on the index pulse from the ram axis servo that resulted in inconsistent homing. This was a pain mostly because they expect you to calibrate the ram axis by physically moving switch locations and indexing the pulley. Not worth it. Just change your die height in the die library to compensate for wherever it's at.

I added switches to bypass auto mode to prevent unexpected station changes when prototyping. Not critical, but it defaults to auto after every program change and you can forget that. I also added a low speed all of the time mode for flattening or precise bends (the backgauge bounces at the high to low speed transition).

Be aware that the hydraulic positioning valves can require you to add +-15 degrees of correction factor on a bend depending on the tonnage it takes, but is then consistent after that. The controller is not the issue, the pressure dependent positioning valve is. Once you get a feel for it you'll rarely be off by more than 2 degrees on a first bend.

We maintain air bends in all materials within one degree. Some parts we can typically keep within half of a degree.

There are nuances for precise or complex work that probably don't apply to you. We make very complex parts on this brake, and are only now upgrading.

joebass said:

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My biggest question is can I use my American tooling to get started? Also what if the controller shits the bed? Can I still use the brake manually? Like I said this is fab shop work, not precision. Im open to investing in better tooling down the road, but would like to get by with what I have for now, as we just bought an ironworker, larger lathe, and If I buy this money will be tight for a few months.

Click to expand...

You probably won't be able to use American tools with the existing toolholders. They do make toolholders that will hold both American and Euro tooling (mine has them), so if you had a 'bunch' of American tooling you still wanted to use, it may make sense to buy a set of them.

Universal Press Brake Punch Tool Holder – JR Machinery Online Store

As for reversing gooseneck tools, you can reverse Euro punches,but just involves turning the toolholder around (2 bolts). No big deal when you only need to reverse 2 holders to do a run of a hundred parts - less fun to need the whole length of the machine for one part (they do make double sided Euro holders, but that takes the American tools out of the question.

Fish On said:

You probably won't be able to use American tools with the existing toolholders. They do make toolholders that will hold both American and Euro tooling (mine has them), so if you had a 'bunch' of American tooling you still wanted to use, it may make sense to buy a set of them.

Universal Press Brake Punch Tool Holder – JR Machinery Online Store

As for reversing gooseneck tools, you can reverse Euro punches,but just involves turning the toolholder around (2 bolts). No big deal when you only need to reverse 2 holders to do a run of a hundred parts - less fun to need the whole length of the machine for one part (they do make double sided Euro holders, but that takes the American tools out of the question.

Click to expand...

Those Promecams look a whole lot like our Adira, and I think another brand that makes the same thing.

But the tool holders attach in a way that they cannot be flipped 180 to flip the tooling. They do, however, have a flippable insert for switching between American and European tooling.





I forgot to mention that the controller has a manual mode where you type in numbers instead of angles, and incremental jog mode, and a full manual mode where the servos are off and you can spin the ram axis handwheel manually. Or just off, which does the same thing.

There is no handwheel for the backgauge movement, but it's a pulley driven ballscrew and making a bracket to hold a handwheel would be trivial should it come down to it.

Also, the controller plugs into a regular 115V outlet, and the hydraulic pump runs on a 208V 20A circuit, perfect for use with rotary phase converters. Unless the promecams are somehow different in this area.

Strostkovy said:

Those Promecams look a whole lot like our Adira, and I think another brand that makes the same thing.

But the tool holders attach in a way that they cannot be flipped 180 to flip the tooling. They do, however, have a flippable insert for switching between American and European tooling.

Click to expand...

So you have tool holders that are more like the one on this machine? (5th pic, mouse over to zoom).

1983 DI-ACRO PROMECAM RG-35-20 6ft 35 TON PRESS BRAKE | eBay



I have this style, and in the catalog, they were labeled "Promecam style", so I was just assuming that's what you had. With these, the holder and the wedge can be unbolted and reversed.
Holder/Adapter (European Precision) | Wide Selection Of Press Brake Tools| Wilson Tool

Fish On said:

So you have tool holders that are more like the one on this machine? (5th pic, mouse over to zoom).

1983 DI-ACRO PROMECAM RG-35-20 6ft 35 TON PRESS BRAKE | eBay



I have this style, and in the catalog, they were labeled "Promecam style", so I was just assuming that's what you had. With these, the holder and the wedge can be unbolted and reversed.
Holder/Adapter (European Precision) | Wide Selection Of Press Brake Tools| Wilson Tool

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That brake looks like a very... retro version of what we have. Same with the toolholders.

I don't think the holder is the issue, just the brake we have is only machined on one side to accept the toolholders. If you put it on backwards the clamps would be cockeyed and toolholder wouldn't be on center.

Here's the Brake, Its in my shop and wired up, everything seems to work.

All in perspective. Late 80's is modern to some. But ancient to others. This is 2020 afterall.

Scruffy887 said:

All in perspective. Late 80's is modern to some. But ancient to others. This is 2020 afterall.

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Yup...To some of us "Hydraulic" = "Modern"....

joebass said:

Here's the Brake, Its in my shop and wired up, everything seems to work.View attachment 307620

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looks like it has several American standard style die adaptors mounted on it already.