Sheet Forming Processes

Chapter 7
 Sheet forming practice
• Most common commercial materials are carbon steels
• Aluminum and titanium alloys more and more used

• Sheet metal forming consists of three basic processes:

– Cutting to form a shape (blank)
– Forming by bending, stretching and deep drawing
– Finishing
Punching
Blanking
Fine Blanking
Stamping
Embossing
Sheet, Plate

Shearing
Deburring
Blank

Slitting
Cleaning
Cutting
Coating
Sawing
Bending
Roll forming
Stretch forming
Deep drawing
Rubber forming
Spinning
Peen forming
Superplastic forming
Explosive forming
Magnetic pulse forming

Making blanks Forming Finishing

 General characteristics

• Metal sheets are characterized by a high ratio between the surface area
and thickness
• Forming of sheets is carried out by tensile forces in the plane of the sheet
• Thickness decrease should be generally avoided, as it can lead to necking
and fracture

• Advantages
– light weight
– versatile shapes
– low cost processes
• Disadvantages
– tooling costs (suitable for high production runs)
Elongation

s = Ke n
e necking = n

A large value of n
indicates good
formability
Localized vs. diffuse necking
Whether necking is localised
or diffuse depends on the
strain-rate sensitivity m; the
higher the value of m, the
more diffuse the neck
becomes.

Good formability: high

uniform elongation + high
post-uniform elongation

n ­­ m ­­
 Normal anisotropy

æw ö
lnçç 0 ÷÷
e w
R= w = è f ø
et æt ö
lnçç 0 ÷÷
è tf ø

Average normal anisotropy

R0 + 2R45 + R90
R =
4
Average normal anisotropy
 Sheet cutting
• Rectangular blanks created by • Shearing starts with cracks
shears, saws, rotary cutters developed on the top and
• These blanks can bottom by exceptionally high
– be further sheared into shear stresses
more complex shapes – A fracture process
– be further formed (bent, • The punch is typically the
deep drawn, etc) into more moving part
complex shapes • The die is the stationary part
– also be the final product
 Basics of the sheet cutting

• Typically rough fracture

surfaces are created
• Smoothing of this
surface occurs by
rubbing on the shear
blades or the die
 10
Clearance effect

(a) Effect of clearance c between the punch and die on the deformation zone in
shearing. As clearance increases, the material tends to be pulled into the die, rather
than being sheared. In practice, clearances usually range between 2% and 10% of
the thickness of the sheet. (b) Microhardness (HV) contours for a 6.4-mm-thick
(0.25-in.-thick) AISI 1020 hot-rolled steel in the sheared region.
 11
Maximum process force

Fmax = 0.7 t L (UTS)

where
F force
t workpiece thickness
L total sheared length (the circumference in this case)
UTS Ultimate tensile strength of the workpiece material
Fine blanking 12
 Bending

• Advantages
– Easy to perform
– Simple, low cost tooling
– Fairly precise

• Disadvantages
– Limited in the shapes it can
produce
– Spring back difficult to
estimate
– Some materials difficult to Bend Allowance: length of the neutral
bend without tearing or axis in the bend area
necking
NB: length of bend=width of the sheet
 Process mechanics
• Bend allowance
L = a (R + kT) eo = ei =
1
(2R / t ) + 1
where
• a is bend angle in radians
• L is the bend allowance
• R is bend radius
• T is thickness
• k is constant (ranges from 0.33 { R<2T} to 0.5 {R>2T})
• Neutral Axis
– Is located where the engineering strain is zero
– If it is at the center of the sheet, k = 1/2 and
– Bend allowance = a(R + T/2)
• Engineering strain
1 R
eo = ei = ¯¯ eo ­­
(2R / T ) + 1 t
 Minimum bend radius

• As the material is bent, the tensile strain at the outer

fibers increases until they crack
• The bend conditions for failure are best described
by the bend radius at which cracking occurs
• The Minimum Bend Radius (MBR) is defined to
occur when a crack appears at the outer fibers
• The terminology is to describe this condition in
terms of the thickness of the material
I.E.> the MBR is 1T, 2T, 5T, 10T etc
 Minimum bend radius
• The true strain at cracking
on the outer fibers is equal
to the strain at fracture of
the sheet metal
• Hypotheses: the material is
homogeneous and isotropic;
the sheet is bent in a state
of plane stress

æA ö æ 100 ö
e f = lnçç 0 ÷÷ = lnç ÷
è Af ø è 100 - r ø
where r = % reduction of area of
the sheet in a tensile test
æ 1 ö æ R +T ö
e o = ln(1 + eo ) = lnçç1 + ÷÷ = lnçç ÷÷
è (2R / T ) + 1ø è R + (T / 2) ø
Minimum (R/T)=(50/r)-1
Minimum bend radius
 Bendability
• It can be increased through heating or by application of
hydrostatic pressure
• It depends on:
– Edge condition of sheet
• Rough edges decrease bendability
– Amount and shape of inclusions
• Stringers more detrimental than globular shaped
inclusions
– Amount of cold work on edges due to shearing
– Anisotropy
– Elastic modulus - the springback phenomenon
 Springback
The final bend angle af is
It is caused by the elastic behavior of workpiece smaller and the final
material – elastic recovery bending radius Rf is larger

æ Tö æ Tö
Bend _ Allowance = ç Ri + ÷a i = ç Rf + ÷a f
è 2ø è 2ø
where:
Ri is the required bend radius
Rf is the actual bend radius
T is the thickness

Springback factor

a f (2Ri / T ) + 1
Ks = =
a i (2Rf / T ) + 1
 Springback

a f (2Ri / T ) + 1
Ks = =
a i (2Rf / T ) + 1

Ks=1, no springback
Ks=0, complete elastic recovery

Springback factor K, for various materials: (a) 2024-0 and

7075-0 aluminum; (b) austenitic stainless steels; (c) 2024-
T aluminum; (d) 1/4- hard austenitic stainless steels; (e)
1/2-hard to full-hard austenitic stainless steels.
Springback

3
Ri æ RiY ö æ RiY ö
= 4ç ÷ - 3ç ÷ +1
Rf è ET ø è ET ø
where
• Ri is the required bend radius
• Rf is the actual bend radius
• Y is the uniaxial yield stress
• E is the elastic modulus
• T is the thickness
Springback

It can be
compensated by

– Overbending
– Applying
compressive
stresses to the
bend zone
– Stretch
bending/forming
– Raising
temperature
 23
Temperature effect on springback

Reduction of material flow

stress with temperature
increase

Reduction of elastic
recovery

Elastic recovery at different

temperatures. Material AA 5052
 Process maximum force
Fmax = (k UTS L T2)/W , excluding friction
– Where
• UTS is the yield strength of the material
• L is the length of the bend
• T is the material thickness
• W is the width of the die opening
• k is a constant that depends on the die shape (k=1.2-1.33 for V-
shaped dies)
• The bending force is also a function of punch travel; it increases from
zero to a maximum
 Stretching

• The sheet metal is clamped around its edges and stretched over a die
or form block, which moves upward, downward, or sideways
• The shape is developed entirely at the expense of the sheet thickness
• To be controlled the amount of stretching to avoid tearing
 Deep drawing

Advantages Disadvantages
Very high production rates (e.g. cans) Limited shapes
Can make parts no other process can make Material quality critical to obtain high-quality parts
Containers of all shapes and sizes Dies are expensive
 27
States of stress

Under the blankholder (A position):

• Compressive through the thickness
• Tensile along the radius
• Compressive along the circumference
due to decreasing blank circumference

In the die (B position):

• Mostly tensile in the punch direction
• Also tensile at right angles to the punch
direction because of the cup contraction
under tensile stresses in the cup wall
• Stresses cause material to thin in
punch direction and shrink around the
die in the circumferential direction
 Deep drawing parameters
• Blankholder force
– Too high - workpiece tears
– Too low - cup gets wrinkles
• Radius/diameter of the punch
• Diameter of the blank
• Thickness of the blank
• Clearance between the punch and die
– Clearances usually 1.07 to 1.14 thickness
– Too low - blank pierced
• Friction/lubrication
• Radius of entry into the die
• Radius on end of the punch
– too small - cracking at corners
– too large - wrinkling
• Punch force (dependent variable)
 Process maximum force

Composed by the forces required to:

• compress the sheet in the flange circumferentially
• overcome friction between the blank and blankholder and die surfaces
• bend and unbend the sheet around the draw radii

æ D0 ö
Fmax = pDp t 0 (UTS )ç - 0 .7 ÷
ç Dp ÷
è ø
 Drawability
Limiting Drawing Ratio (LDR)

LDR = max Blank diameter

Punch diameter

Isotropic
LDR=2.718
material
 Planar anisotropy

• If R0 and R90 are different, the metal deforms

differently in different directions of the drawing
process
• This causes earing
– The top edge of the cup is no longer in one
plane (wavy)
– Ears must be trimmed off resulting in scrap

DR = (R0 - 2 R45 + R90)/2

– Where R is the Normal Anisotropy and the

subscripts are the direction in which R is
measured relative to the rolling direction
– “Ears” are formed when DR is not zero
Forming limit diagram FLD
 Nakajima test

(a) Schematic illustration of the

Bulge tests results on steel sheets of various
punch-stretch test on sheet
widths. The first specimen (farthest left)
specimens with different widths,
stretched farther before cracking than the last
clamped at the edges. The narrower
specimen. From left to right, the state of
the specimen, the more uniaxial is
stress changes from uniaxial to biaxial
the stretching. (b) A large square
stretching.
specimen stretches biaxially under
the hemispherical punch.
 Forming limit diagram FLD

(a) Forming-limit diagram (FLD) for various sheet metals. The major strain is always
positive. The region above the curves is the failure zone; hence, the state of strain in
forming must be such that it falls below the curve for a particular material; R is the normal
anisotropy. (b) Note the definition of positive and negative minor strains. If the area of the
deformed circle is larger than the area of the original circle, the sheet is thinner than
the original, because the volume remains constant during plastic deformation.
Nuovi target richiesti dal mercato
Volumi di produzione contenuti
Continua innovazione di prodotto
Necessità di attrezzature meno costose e di ridurre i tempi di set-up

Technical Flexibility

Time
Incremental sheet forming
Examples
Example – ankle support
 tomography (X-ray CT). Concerning a human skull with defect as shown in Fig. 1(a), in order to
aphy (X-ray CT). Concerning a human skull with defect as shown (a) in
Peripheral
Fig. 1(a),support
in order to (b) Local support
repair the defective region of the skull, a few strategies may be employed
Figure such
4: DSIF as mirroring the
he defective region of the skull, a few strategies may be employed such as mirroring theToolpath generation concept

Example – cranial implant

geometric data from one side of the skull to the other due to the symmetry of the skull or
ric data from one side of the skull to the other due to the symmetry of the skull or
re-construction of the missing geometric shape from NURBS approximation [24]. In this work, the
Experiments
truction of the missing geometric shape from NURBS approximation [24]. In this work, the
second approach was employed.
approach was employed. Experiment setup. A newly developed DSIF machine was used in this work as shown in Fig. 5. In
this machine, the master and slave tools are placed at each side of the sheet blank. Each tool is moved
independently along their three axes, namely X, Y, Z and A, B, C for six degree of freedoms. The
synchronization of the tools’ movement is achieved by a custom developed control system, which
Original model & identification of
follows pre-defined two toolpaths for both the master and slave tools as mentioned in section 2.3.
surrounding area

(a) Original model (b) Identification of surrounding area

(a) Original model (b) Identification of surrounding area
Figure 1: Skull Geometric model for cranial implant
Figure 1: Skull Geometric model for cranial implant
In order to repair the defective region of the skull, the blue region close to the hole is used as the
rder to repair the defective region of the skull, the blue region close to the hole is used as the
Generation
ng area of the cranialofplate
mounting the
area of theincremental
cranial plate as shown in Fig 1(b). Based on the defined region, construction
as shown in Fig 1(b). Based on the
(a)the
Developed defined
DISF region,(b)
machine construction
Two tools in
andFig.
clamping system (c) DSIF with local support
curves were approximated according to surrounding area of the hole as shown 2(a). By
sheet
were forming
approximated tool
according path
to the surrounding area of the hole as shown in Fig.
Figure 2(a).
5: DSIF Bymachine and forming of cranial plate
using these constructional lines, a free form surface was established as shown in Fig. 2(b), which not
hese constructional lines,
only repairs thea missing
free formgeometry
surface was
of established
the skull, as shown
but in Fig. 2(b),
alsoGrade
matches which
thetitanium not
surrounding areatofor the the cranial implant. As high contact
epairs the missing geometry of the skull, but also In the experiment,
matches the surrounding1 pure area for the was used produce
mounting of the cranial plate. As thestress edgemayof the approximated
occur at the surface may not
tool-sheet be ball
on atools
plane,
ng of the cranial plate. As the edge of the approximated surface may not be interface,
on a plane,roller were employed to reduce the friction and
additional supplementary surfaces are required,
improve as
the shown
surface in Fig. 2
quality. (c).
Using the developed geometric model and toolpaths, the cranial plates
nal supplementary surfaces are required, as shown in Fig. 2 (c).
(a) Approximation of (b) NURBS approximation
were formed using different strategies as shown in Fig. 6(a). By trimming (c) Generation of supplement
the blanking area, a
construction lines for curved
finished cranial plate can be obtained as shown in Fig. 6(b). hole filling surface for DSIF
Figure 2: Generation of DSIF model for cranial reconstruction
DSIF 536
forming strategies. In the DSIF process, two counter tools are employed to provide extra
536
flexibility in the forming process. A few strategies have been proposed: Cao et al [22] developed an
accumulative forming approach, in which in-out toolpath strategy was employed. Meier et a
Finished and trimmed part
proposed two DSIF forming strategies including DSIF with peripheral support and DSIF with loca
support [25]. Concerning the cranial plate to be generated as shown in Fig. 2(c), the geometry is
relatively simple and the good formability of pure titanium ensures successful forming of this part
Under such circumstances, the geometric accuracy becomes important in the process design. The
accumulative DSIF strategy may not be suitable for this case due to the uncertainties in the geometric
accuracy. In this(a)work, DSIF
Finished with both local and (b)
part peripheral
Trimmed supports
cranial are considered and the two
plate
strategies are designed, as shown in Fig. 3. 6: Finished part
Figure

538