Patent ID: 7004000

Claim:
A method of deforming a thin walled body to coordinate with a pre-applied design on the wall of the body and in which one or more operations comprising necking of the body are carried out, the method comprising: (i) holding the body securely in a clamp of a holding station of a multi-station holding table, the clamp being arranged to clamp the respective body non-rotatably; (ii) advancing a multi-station tooling table relative to the holding table such that at a coordinated deformation station of the tooling table, an internal tooling part is inserted into the interior of the body and an external tooling part is positioned externally of the body whilst the body is clamped securely at the holding station; and, (iii) operating the tooling to engage with and deform the body at a predetermined wall zone, to coordinate with said pre-applied design on the wall of the body, whilst the body is clamped in a fixed orientation in the holding station; wherein the tooling table and holding table are rotationally indexable relative to one another to bring a plurality of said bodies in succession to the coordinated deformation tooling station; the predetermined wall zone is co-aligned with the tooling by rotation of the body about an axis and then securing non-rotatably in the clamp at the holding station in said fixed orientation for the coordinated deformation of the wall of the body.