Comparison of conventional deep drawing, hydromechanical deep-drawing and high pressure sheet metal forming by numerical experiments

Abstract

Increasing use of new technologies in automotive and aircraft applications requires intensive research and developments on sheet metal forming processes. This study focuses on the assessment of sheet hydroforming, hydro-mechanical deep drawing and conventional deep-drawing processes by performing a systematic analysis by numerical simulations. Circular, elliptic, rectangular and square cross-section cups have been selected for the geometry spectrum. Within the range of each cross section, depth, drawing ratio and fillet radii have been altered systematically. St14 stainless steel has been used as the material throughout the study. The deformation behavior has been described by an elasto-plastic material model and all numerical simulations have been carried out by using a dynamic-explicit commercial finite element code. During the analyses each workpiece is produced by the three competing processes. The analyses results such as sheet thickness distribution, necking, forming of radii etc., are used for assessing the success of each forming process alternative. The analyses revealed that depending on the workpiece geometry and dimensional properties certain processes are preferable for obtaining satisfactory products. The process windows for each process have been established based on the analyzed parameters of the three different product geometries. This data is expected to be useful for selecting the appropriate production process for a given workpiece geometry. © 2005 American Institute of Physics.