Tag Archives: plate rolling

Albina Co., Inc. Celebrating 80 Years in the Steel Bending Industry!

Albina Co., Inc., located outside Portland, Oregon, has been providing customers with innovative, quality curved steel services and products since 1939. A family owned and operated, third generation business, run by Brian Smith, specializes in structural steel, tube and pipe bending, plate rolling and fabrication. Albina produces virtually any metal component that needs to bend or curve without the use of pre-formed fittings. Albina has provided curved steel for many high-profile buildings, stadiums and structures in the United States and Canada. Albina was the steel bender of choice on the recently completed Amazon Spheres in Seattle,Washington.

Albina is an industry leader in research and development and in 2018, purchased an MCP30 by Davi, the first type of bending machine in the United States with a “iRoll” smart camera system, allowing operators to view the part being bent compared to a radius template on the control screen.  The machine has the ability to “learn and remember” how different materials bend, where the rolls need to be positioned, and how much spring back is associated with a bend / material.

Brian and Jaime Smith by the Davi Machine
Brian and Jaime Smith by the Davi Machine

Albina also purchased a Bend-Tech Dragon A400 Plasma Cutter, a commercial grade CNC tube cutting ,engraving, and marking machine with the world’s most powerful CAD/CAM software. Other new equipment included new welders, jib cranes, induction heating coils, an electric forklift and 40 sets of tooling.

Albina was an instrumental player in the development of the first ever Design Guide of its kind in the United States offering information on the fabrication, design and detailing of curved members. Design Guide 33 “Curved Member Design” was released in October 2018 by the AISC Bender/Roller committee and is an invaluable resource for the industry!

Front Cover of Design Guide 33: “Curved Member Design”http://www.aisc.org/curvedsteel

Albina not only has one of the newest, most technologically advanced machines on the market, Albina also has one of the oldest, custom made bending machines ever created! In honor of the 80th Anniversary, Albina created a museum on site, called “The Smith-sonian”, honoring the family name and housing one of the first ever pieces of equipment that Albina owned and used to bend materials. Brian’s grandfather built the“Model-T” bending machine in the early 1940’s utilizing the transmission and differential from a “Model-T” Ford. This machine was used until the 1990’s to bend various materials such as pipe, tube, and square and rectangular hollow structural steel. “The Smith-sonian” is ready for visitors. Cheers to 80 Years!

The Smith-sonian Is Open for Visitors! 

Another Fabricator Happy with the Quality of Our Plate Rolling!

Albina recently rolled ½” THICK A36 PLATE X 91″ WIDE to create:
1 cylinder: 40″ ID X 91″ LONG
1 cone: 29″ ID X 40″ ID X 49.5″ TALL

Albina’s scope of work was to prebend, trim, roll, and tack weld per the drawings provided and turn it over to the fabricator for fabrication. After we completed the job, the fabricator had this message for us, “I just wanted to pass along the attached photo and compliment on the rolling you just did for us. The parts literally could not have fit better than they did which makes our job as fabricators so much easier. Please pass along a thank you to your team for another great job.”

Rolled Plate Cylinder and Cone

Spiral Rolled Plate for Spiral Staircase in Multi-Million Dollar Luxury Home on Green Street in San Francisco, CA.

We recently spiral rolled 1/2″ and 1″ plate for a custom spiral staircase in a multi-million dollar luxury home on Green Street in San Francisco, California.
We provided the rolled plate for the staircase and then flat plane rolled the plate for the landings. The tightest radius was a 29.75” center line radius.

Spiral Rolled Plate for spiral staircase on Green Street in San Francisco, CA.

Spiral Rolled Plate for spiral staircase on Green Street in San Francisco, CA.

Spiral Rolled Plate for spiral staircase on Green Street in San Francisco, CA.

Coils and Rolled Plate Cylinders

We recently completed bending some component parts for a customer which were a mix of carbon steel and nickel plate, pipe and bar. In the first image, we bent the coil, the terminals, the cylinder and the cylinder stiffeners. In the second image, we bent the inner and out cylinders on the top half. On the third image, we bent the upper and lower cylinders. Our customer was so thrilled with the parts that we provided, we received the following email from them: “The components Albina did for us were fantastic! Please pass along to your guys that the items you guys made were just about perfect. It really helped the fabrication process go smoothly. We really appreciate the work you did on this project for us.”

Cooling spool coil

cylinders bent out of plate

cylinders bent out of plate

Rolled Plate and Pipe Help Customer Construct a “Chute”

We recently received these pictures from our customer. They used our rolled steel materials to construct this “chute.” Albina rolled 6″ SCH40 A53B ERW down to a 12 ft radius (tightest) and also rolled 1/2″ A36 plate to fit to the laser cut plate on the face of the chute. We are hoping to get some pictures of the “chute” in action and will pass them along as soon as we do.

Rolled steel plate and pipe for custom chute

Rolled steel plate and pipe for custom chute

Rolled steel plate and pipe for custom chute

Do You Want to Extend the Life of Your Industrial Pipe Elbows, Reduce Downtime and Maintenance Costs?

If you answered yes, than you should consider wearbacks for your elbows. For decades, Albina has supplied customers with bent elbows where we weld a plate or channel to the outside of the bend (acting as the wearback). A wearback is installed to act as an additional layer to the bend, when the backside of an elbow finally is worn through, any materials running in the piping system will remain inside and the piping system will continue to function due to the extra layer of material on the backside of the elbow. We recently bent some 8″ SCH80 T304L S/S SMLS to 30° elbows. After bending the elbows, we bent and fabricated wearbacks out of ½” stainless plate and welded the wearbacks to the outside of the pipe elbows.

Albina’s New Plate Roll Is In Action!

Our new plate roll is busy and we have some great projects on the machine right now. We are in the process of bending material for some custom tanks made out of Nickel material. This project consists of various tanks rolled to different diameters. All material is Nickel 201 ranging in thickness from 3/16” to 3/8”. The plate sections are up to 72” long prior to rolling. Diameters we are rolling to range from 57” to 107”. In addition to the tanks we are proving the cooling tubes as well. Cooling tubes are bent out of 1” Sch40 Nickel 201 (with terminals) to match the diameter of the tanks. Needless to say, this is a fun and challenging project!

Do you Need Some Rolled Plate?

Albina has purchased a new plate roll to add to our capabilities!
This new plate roll is a Lemas Hydraulic 4-roll, 3/8” capacity over 6 feet long.
The diameter of all rolls measures 7.87”. This machine will allow us to roll material tighter then we could previously roll. It will also allow us to roll thinner material then we could previously roll. We had a recent project requiring us to roll some very tight cylinders which prompted the purchase of the machine, but we are excited to take on more new work that we previously had to turn away.

Steel Plate Rolling

End uses for rolled steel plate are vast. Products made from rolled steel plate include cylinders, conical shapes, column wraps (stiffeners), bridge supports and industrial duct systems. Albina Co., Inc.’s plate rolling capabilities include 3/4″ plate up to 10’0″ in width (pre-bend up to 5/8″ thick). Albina can also roll flat Bar the Easy Way to any thickness and size thru 4″ x 22″ where the section is dependent on thickness to width. For an in-depth explanation of the steel plate rolling process see our Bending Methods page. For more images and rolled steel product applications visit our Manufacturing and Industrial Parts page to see the various tanks we have produced as well as the full scope of parts we produce for various manufacturers.

Rolled Plate Creates Spiral Stair Stringers

Albina Co., Inc. recently rolled steel plate to create the spiral stair stringers for a beautiful custom curved steel staircase in California. The plate sections consisted of 1/2″ x 14″ A36 plate rolled counter clockwise to a 38′ 8″ radius and 43′ 9″ radius. For portions of the landing area, 1″ X 14″ A36 plate was rolled anywhere from a 37′ 7″ radius to a 42′ 6″ radius. Various other structural steel members were bent including 4″ X 4″ X ¼” ANGLE A36 rolled legout to a 37′ 6″ radius.

steel spiral stair stringers from rolled plate

steel spiral stair stringers from rolled plate

steel spiral stair stringers from rolled plate

steel spiral stair stringers from rolled plate