Author : Aher Vaishnavi, Birajdar Ushakiran, Jadhav Pournima, Kunturwar Ankit and Nilesh T Dhokane

In radiator there are chances of the tubes in header plate to move laterally which will cause leakages, low heat transfer rates and decreased efficiency. In order to overcome this possibility, the tubes of radiator are flared to restrict the lateral motion of the tubes. The process of flaring plays an important role to constrain the system of header plate. We had developed a station which is used for flaring operation of radiator tubes which increases the contact area of the tube to increase the heat exchange rate and avoid leakages which highly affect the efficiency of the radiator and decreases the cycle time of production. The flaring operation of each tube by a single flaring tube is time consuming on industrial level. The customer of our station TATA TOYO wanted a semi-automated station for tube expansion of radiator. The tube expansion station offers flexibility with respect to parameters of number of holes, diameter of tube, pitch; according to the design of individual radiator. The flaring tool which is used for operation of tube expansion is mounted on a LM rail for sliding the whole tool mounting set up. The tool is powered by a standard hydraulic cylinder. Indexing is done manually to move the tool set up to the next series of tubes. The flaring is simultaneously done on two or more tubes which reduce the cycle time of the station. As the production rate is low it is semi-automated. For the whole set up one electric power pack is used. Mild steel is used as material for entire station considering its high welding, anticorrosive, ductile and malleable properties. The station is designed vertical to reduce floor area and ease of installation of radiator on the radiator plates of the station. This station will be used in Diesel Generator system so an attempt is made to increase the efficiency of the radiator with minimum Build-In time of the radiator assembly.

Keywords: Tube expansion, flaring, semi-automated.