foldingmetal.com beta

Turn sheet-metal DXF bend lines into easy-to-fold cut patterns

Upload a flat pattern, and every bend line becomes a row of slots, tabs and end notches you can cut on a laser or plasma table and fold by hand.

Bend line selection
Preview Press Enter in any field to refresh
Preview of the processed cut pattern

Cut options

All dimensions are in millimetres.

Slots along bend lines

Diagram: a bend line replaced by a row of rounded slots, with tab width between slots, slot width across the bend and slot length along it
mm
Material left between slots.
mm
Across the bend. 0 = single kerf line.
mm
Along the bend line.

Notches at bend line ends

Diagram: a notch cut into the part edge at the end of a bend line, showing notch depth and notch width
mm
mm

How it works

  1. Upload your DXF

    Draw the flat pattern with every bend line on its own layer (for example BEND), or give them a distinct color or line style.

  2. Tune tabs, slots and notches

    Adjust the dimensions to suit your material thickness and cutting process, then refresh the preview.

  3. Download the DXF

    Get a new DXF with the cut pattern in place of the bend lines, ready for your CAM software.

Questions

What does the bend-line layer need to contain?

Plain LINE entities, one per bend, drawn edge to edge across the part (polylines and arcs are not picked up). By default the tool looks for lines on a layer named BEND; you can instead select them by color (an AutoCAD color number such as 1 for red) or by line style name. The rest of the drawing is left as it is.

What does Slot Width do?

Slot Width is the size of each slot across the bend line. At 0 each slot is a single kerf line, which suits thin sheet. Above 0, each slot becomes a closed outline with rounded ends, which leaves more room for thicker material to fold.

What happens to my file?

Your DXF is uploaded to cloud storage and processed there to make the preview and the output DXF. Files are stored under a random name, used only to make your preview and output, never shared, and deleted automatically after 1 day. See the Privacy Policy for details. Please don't upload drawings you aren't allowed to share with an online service.

Which units are used?

All option values are in millimetres. If your drawing is in inches, convert the values before entering them.