Drawing (manufacturing)

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This article is about the manufacturing technique. For the art form, see Drawing.

Drawing is a manufacturing process for producing a wire, bar or tube by pulling on a material until it increases in length. This is typically accompanied by a thinning out of the material, usually through a reduction in the girth.

This technique has long been used to produce flexible metal wire by drawing the material through a series of dies (holes) of decreasing size. More recently drawing has been used with molten glass to produce high quality optical fibers.

Drawing can also be used to pull metal over a die (male mold) to create a specific shape. For example, stainless steel kitchen sinks are formed by drawing the stainless steel sheet metal stock over a form (the die) in the shape of the sink. Beverage cans are formed by drawing aluminium stock over can-shaped dies. By comparison, hydroforming forces metal into a female mold using pressure.