The Alumiline Stainless-Steel Entrance System

N.
Bienenfeld1
The Alumiline Stainless-Steel

Entrance System
REFERENCE: Bienenfeld, N., "The Alumiline Stainless-Steel Entrance

System," Stainless Steel for Architectural Use, ASTM STP 454, American
Society for Testing and Materials, 1969, pp. 83-96.
ABSTRACT: A lock seamed tubular stainless-steel system of 1.75-in. by 4-in.
framing and narrow stile doors was developed to meet accepted strength and
design standards of commercial, industrial, and institutional architectural
applications, and to produce the new system at much lower costs. Whereas
all previous designs required supporting substructures of wood, carbon steel,
or aluminum, and involved long hours of manual shop labor, the new
Alumiline System was designed to be self-supporting and capable of being
fabricated relatively quickly.
The main tubular framing sections were designed to meet basic deflection
standards of the Architectural Industry and were tested over an 11-ft span.
The tubes performed very close to theoretical calculations.
Cost comparisons were made between older methods of stainless-steel
fabrication and the new Alumiline techniques. The new fabricating procedures reduced labor costs by 80 to 90 percent and permitted selling prices of
assembled units to be reduced to less than half of previous levels.
KEY WORDS: stainless steels, tubes, deflection, tests, doors, roll forming,
cutting, welding, punching, protective coatings, glazing, brake forming
Introduction
Stainless steel has been designed by architects into exterior doors, entrances, curtain walls, and fascia construction because of the strength and
permanence of the material and its freedom from maintenance requirements. However, the relatively high per pound metal cost, and the high
fabrication costs due to the inherent strength and toughness of the material
itself, have restricted the architectural use of stainless steel in the past.
The purposes of this study were:
1. To design a stainless-steel door-and-entrance system compatible with
the deflection and design needs of the architectural industry.
2. To design a stainless-steel door-and-entrance system which could be
manufactured with minimum fabrication costs.
Copyright by ASTM Int'l (all rights reserved); Tue Dec 20 01:46:31 EST 2016
1
Downloaded/printed by
UCLA (UCLA) pursuant to License Agreement. No further reproductions authorized.
President, The Alumiline Corp., Pawtucket, R.I.

83
84
STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE
For the purpose of this report, the subject matter is subdivided into two
separate sections designated:
1. Deflection Characteristics of a Roll-Formed Lock-Seamed StainlessSteel Tube.
2. Manufacturing Techniques.
Deflection Characteristics of a Roll-Formed
Lock-Seamed Stainless-Steel Tube
Engineering Development
In the commercial, industrial, and institutional architectural field, the
1.75-in. by 4-in. by 0.125-in. extruded aluminum (alloy 6063-T5) tube is
considered "standard." It is therefore convenient to consider this product as
the reference for wind-load deflection requirements.
Wind load on a strip-window expanse on the face of a typical store front
(Fig. 1) is considered to be carried by the intermediate vertical mullions.
FIG. 1Typical store-front construction.
Section A-A shows usual store-front tubular mullion construction. The anchorage of the mullion at the intersection (Z?) with the head and sill horizontals is made with a screw-clip fastening which is not "rigid." Hence,
for deflection
calculations, the mullion ends are considered "free."
Downloaded/printed
by
BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM
85
Each vertical mullion is considered to carry a uniformly applied wind

load on one half the glass area either side of the mullion as designated by
the shaded area in Fig. 1. It follows that wind-load determinations are made
on the basis of:
1. a simple beam
2. a uniformally distributed load
3. "free" ends
as shown diagrammatically in Fig. 2. The deflection formula for these conditions is:
where:
D = deflection at the mid-point of the beam, in.
W = total applied load, Ib
L = unsupported span, in.
E = modulus of elasticity, psi
/ = moment of intertia, in.4
FIG. 2Simple beam uniformly loaded with free ends.
For testing purposes, it is much easier to work with a load concentrated

at the center of the beam. For these conditions (Fig. 3):
FIG. 3Simple beam center-loaded with free ends.

For an aluminum tube 1.75-in. by 4-in. by 0.125-in.,
where 7 i is the moment of inertia of the aluminum tube.
A
86
The task was to design a stainless-steel tube with the same deflection
characteristics as the "standard" aluminum tube. The required moment of
inertia was determined as follows:
or;
simplifying:
where:
DM = deflection of aluminum tube, in.
D^
= deflection of stainless-steel tube, in.
So
EAI = modulus of elasticity of aluminum = 1.03 x 107 psi
"gs = modulus of elasticity of stainless steel = 2.9 X 107 psi
7gs = moment of inertia of required stainless-steel tube, in.4
Substitution of numerical values yields:
7
Since a 1.7 5-in. by 4-in. aluminum tube is standard design for store fronts
and entrance framing, the stainless-steel tube was also designed to 1.75-in.
by 4-in. external dimensions. The wall thickness was found by using the
formula for a hollow tube (Fig. 4).
FIG. 4Stainless-steel tube.
87
For the stainless-steel tube in Fig. 4,
Solving for t yields:
Although a wall thickness of 0.041 in. would be theoretically satisfactory

for deflection purposes, Alumiline decided to use a nominal 0.048-in. thickness in order to reduce thin-wall effects during loading, to increase resistance
to denting, and to provide metal heavy enough to accept screw threads.
With a wall thickness of 0.048 in.:
Test Procedures
Seven Type 304 stainless-steel 1.75-in. by 4-in. by 0.048-in. tubes, and
four aluminum 1.75-in. by 4-in. by 0.115-in. (average) tubes, were tested
for deflection over an 11-ft. span, with free ends, and with the center load
applied in a direction parallel with the 4-in. face. A proving ring was used to
measure load intensities and deflections were measured using dial indicators.
FIG. 5Photograph of deflection test.
88
The tests (Fig. 5) were conducted independently by Prof. Francis H. Lavelle, at the University of Rhode Island, Kingston, R.I.
The 11-ft. free span was chosen for convenience. Architectural design
requirements limit deflection to 1/175 of the span, or 0.75 in., whichever
comes first. For 11 ft., (132 in.), the 1/175 requirement equals 0.752 in.
which is very close to the nominal 0.75-in. limit.
Center loads were applied in 100-lb increments and the deflection measured. The average of the actual test deflection for the seven stainless-steel
and four aluminum tubes is shown by the dotted lines in Fig. 6.
The average wall thickness of the 1.75-in. by 4-in. aluminum tubes was
0.115 in. The moment of inertia of such a section was calculated to be 2.54
in.4. Theoretical deflections for the stainless-steel and "average" aluminum
tubes were determined by Eq 2.
For aluminum:
For stainless steel:
The results of these calculations are shown in Fig. 6 by the solid lines.
FIG. 6Deflection Curves.
89
From a visional observation, test results and the theoretical deflection

values show a reasonably close correlation through the 0.75-in. maximum
allowable design deflection. Observations over 800 Ib, with corresponding
deflections of over 1 in., were considered unreliable because of some denting
of the tubes from the concentrated loading, and these are not shown on the
graphs.
The aluminum test data show an almost straight-line relationship to correspond with the theory of an integral tubular section loaded within its
elastic limit. The stainless-steel test data show a small curvature which is
probably attributable to slight slippage within the lock seam or possibly to
the non-linear stress-strain curve of stainless steel. Nevertheless, the production stainless-steel tubes more than met design-strength requirements.
Future studies might include comparison of the results of this paper with
the American Iron and Steel Institute 1968 Edition of "Design of LightGage Cold-Formed Stainless Steel Structural Members."
Manufacturing Techniques
Prior to the introduction of the Alumiline System in 1963, stainless-steel
doors and entrances were very costly to manufacture because:
1. The stainless steel had to be wrapped around wood, aluminum, or
carbon steel for structural strength.
2. It took many hours of costly labor to fabricate, finish, and assemble
the doors and entrances.
The concept and fabrication of the Alumiline System were coordinated
to reduce these costs by more efficient design, more efficient use of ma-
FIG. 7Several intermediate stages of progressive roll-formed section.
90
terials, improved manufacturing procedures, and improved installation and

glazing procedures.
Use of Roll-Formed Sections
Alumiline stainless-steel construction is based around seven roll-formed
sections. Roll forming is the most efficient way to form production quantities
of light-gage metal. Flat-coil stock is passed through a series of matched
progressive forming dies until the final shape is developed (Fig. 7). The
seven Alumiline shapes shown hi Fig. 8 clearly indicate that this method
permits manufacture of configurations which cannot be conveniently produced on brake equipment.
FIG. 8Standard Alumiline roll-formed shapes.
91
Brake-forming equipment is usually limited to a section 12 to 16 ft in

length. Because roll forming is a continuous process, lengths are limited only
by transportation restrictions, generally 30 to 40 ft. This is especially important in architectural work where continuous runs of mullions are desired,
and where short lengths would have to be expensively welded or sleeved together.
Use of Self-Supporting Sections
The two tubular frame sections, SS20V and SS20H, and the three tubular
door sections, SS50, SS52, and SS53, are completely self-supporting and do
not require wood, aluminum, or carbon-steel substructures. Not only does
this represent a considerable savings of material, but also, elimination of
the corresponding assembly labor.
FIG. 9Saw-cutting roll-formed sections.
92
STAINESSSTEELFORARCHITECTURALUSE
Cutting Pre-Formed Sections

Brake-formed shapes developed from flat sheet usually produce ends of
sections which are not perfectly flush and square and which often require
secondary filing and fitting in order to secure reasonably tight joints. Because the roll-formed sections go into fabrication production in their final
shape, they can be cut to length quickly (Fig. 9) with abrasive cutting saws
to produce flush and square ends which insure tight joints without secondary filing and fitting.
Punching Operations
Dimensions on brake-formed shapes cannot be held critically, so that
most hardware cut-outs are made by hand cutting or milling. These are extremely laborious operations because stainless steel is such a tough material
to work. Roll forming produces shapes of extremely close tolerance ( 0.005
in. across a 4-in. tubular section, for example), so that punching operations
are convenient, quick, accurate, and inexpensive. Figure 10 shows some of
the Aluiniline punching tools and cut-outs in door and frame sections.
FIG. 10Typical punching tools and cut-outs.
93
Punching of all the cut-outs in an Alumiline door takes about one minute,
as compared to more than one hour of labor which would normally be required to do the same work by milling.
Reducing Frame Assembly Time
The close tolerance of the roll-formed shapes permits frame-tube assembly joint holes to be punched using standard tools. These consistently
dimensioned holes permit the use of pre-punched, low-cost, "standard"
clips to fasten vertical and horizontal frame sections together (Fig. 11). The
use of standard clips and the frame-punching operation, plus the square
flush cut discussed previously, permits fast joint assembly without fitting,
filing, or welding.
Door Welding
Because doors operate under loads which tend to twist the door rails,
welding provides the securest assembly means. Previously, vertical and
horizontal door rails were of the same width and were surface welded where
FIG. 11Punched assembly holes for frame joint.
94
they butted together. This surface welding had to be subsequently ground

flush, and then blended into the finish of the balance of the door.
In the Alumiline door, the vertical rails are % 6 in. wider than the horizontal rails. The horizontals "die" into the verticals, leaving a %2~ m - reveal
which disguises any slight off-centering at the joint. All welding is done in
hidden areas (Fig. 12) so that there is no exposed welding to grind off and
blend. Elimination of grinding and blending reduces fabrication time by
two hours or more.
Surface Finish
Alumiline uses mill pre-polished stainless-steel strip from which to form
the roll-formed sections. The metal is coated with a water-soluble plastic
to eliminate roll-forming pressure marks and to protect the pre-finished
material during transportation and in-plant fabrication. The coating is not
removed until just before final assembly so that completed doors and frames
require a minimum touch-up of the finished surface. In the fabrication of a
standard door and frame, more than two hours of post-fabrication polishing are eliminated by this procedure.
FIG. 12Welding in hidden areas.
95
Glazing Procedures
Glazing beads in the Alumiline System are installed quickly by snapping
them into stainless-steel clips which have been previously spot-welded onto
the stainless-steel tubes (Fig. 13). Spot welding of the glazing clips greatly
reduces labor normally required for drilling and tapping for screw-applied
glazing beads.
FIG. 13Spot-welding glazing clips.
In addition to providing an appearance free of unsightly glazing screws,

the Alumiline glazing beads carry an integral neoprene weathering. This
type of "dry glazing" is much faster than full-bedded compound glazing.
The Alumiline glazing clip is designed so that the glazing beads on each
side can be set in two different stop positions in order to accommodate
glass of various thicknesses between % 6 in. and % in. This is important
where glass-thickness requirements vary with wind-load conditions.
Summary
Prior to the Alumiline Entrance System it usually took 16 to 24 hr to
fabricate
completely a standard stainless-steel door. It takes only 2 hr to
Downloaded/printed
by a standard Alumiline door. Elimination of 80 to 90 percent of the
fabricate
96
labor and more efficient material usage have made it possible for Alumiline
fabricated stainless-steel doors and entrances to be sold for between one
half and one quarter of previous prices. Since 1963 when the Alumiline
System was first produced, thousands of units have been successfully performing, attesting to the validity of the engineering development described
in the first part of this paper and to the acceptance of the basic design and
new economical pricing.

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N.

The Alumiline Stainless-Steel

REFERENCE: Bienenfeld, N., "The Alumiline Stainless-Steel Entrance

President, The Alumiline Corp., Pawtucket, R.I.

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

FIG. 1Typical store-front construction.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

Each vertical mullion is considered to carry a uniformly applied wind

FIG. 2Simple beam uniformly loaded with free ends.

For testing purposes, it is much easier to work with a load concentrated

FIG. 3Simple beam center-loaded with free ends.

where 7 i is the moment of inertia of the aluminum tube.

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

FIG. 4Stainless-steel tube.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

For the stainless-steel tube in Fig. 4,

Solving for t yields:

Although a wall thickness of 0.041 in. would be theoretically satisfactory

FIG. 5Photograph of deflection test.

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

For stainless steel:

FIG. 6Deflection Curves.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

From a visional observation, test results and the theoretical deflection

FIG. 7Several intermediate stages of progressive roll-formed section.

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

terials, improved manufacturing procedures, and improved installation and

FIG. 8Standard Alumiline roll-formed shapes.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

Brake-forming equipment is usually limited to a section 12 to 16 ft in

FIG. 9Saw-cutting roll-formed sections.

Cutting Pre-Formed Sections

FIG. 10Typical punching tools and cut-outs.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

FIG. 11Punched assembly holes for frame joint.

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

they butted together. This surface welding had to be subsequently ground

FIG. 12Welding in hidden areas.

BIENENFELD ON ALUMILINE ENTRANCE SYSTEM

FIG. 13Spot-welding glazing clips.

In addition to providing an appearance free of unsightly glazing screws,

STAINLESS STEEL FOR ARCHITECTURAL USE

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