Method and apparatus for manufacturing metallic support beams for windscreen wiper blade assemblies

A method of manufacturing metallic support beams for windscreen wiper blade assemblies, which includes:

• providing a supply of metallic strip feedstock in a cold condition;
• providing a pair of opposed, spaced apart, cold forming rollers, said pair of cold forming rollers being mounted so that a spacing therebetween can be varied in a controlled manner;
• passing the feedstock in a cold condition through said pair of opposed, spaced apart, cold forming rollers so as to reduce a thickness of at least a portion of said feedstock;
• cyclically varying a spacing between the cold forming rollers during said step of passing, thereby to cyclically vary a thickness reduction of the feedstock and form a rolled strip with a cyclically varying thickness, said spacing between said cold forming rollers being cyclically varied so that as a result of a single pass through said cold forming rollers, the thickness of said feedstock is cyclically reduced to form a rolled strip having a thickness that varies cyclically along its length in a ratio of at least 2:1;
• and
• producing support beams for windscreen wiper blade assemblies from the rolled strip, each support beam having a thickness which varies along its length.