Bearings in Sheet Metal

[JamesCH95]

Originally Posted by squirrel

Another thing you can do if you want to have some fun, is press the bearings into polycarbonate sheet. We discovered that a Forstner drill bit will make a hole just the right size for this press fit.

This works well for smaller mechanism type gearboxes, and I think it has been used by AM to make drivetrain gearboxes too.

We did this for our 2012 shooter. A total of 10 flanged bearings pressed into polycarbonate sheet. Worked great.

To put some numbers to the OP question:

Using a bearing like this one in 5052 aluminum (28KSI YS):

YS*(bearing OD*sheet thickness)=bearing load at material yield

28KSI*(.875*.0625)=1530lbf to reach yield in 5052 aluminum, assuming the bearing is seated properly and nothing is grossly misaligned. This is at least double the working load rating for most bearings of this size.