Equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) is a convenient forming process to extrude material without substantial changes in the sample geometry and this deformation process gives rise to produce ultrafine grained materials. The properties of the materials are strongly dependent on the plastic deformation behaviour during ECAP. The major process variables during ECAP are 1) die geometries, such as a channel angle and coner angles, and 2) the processes variables, such as lubrication and deformation speed. In this study, the plastic deformation behaviour of materials during the ECAP has been theoretically analysed by the finite element method (FEM). The effect of the die friction on the plastic deformation behaviour during the pressing is discussed by means of FEM calculations.

The optimal blank design method by sensitivity analysis has been applied to the formings of oil-pan, tailored blank and front panel as the examples. Die geometry is prepared by a commercial CAD system. Excellent results has been obtained between the numerical results and the target contour shapes. Through the investigation, the proposed systematic method of optimal blank design is found to be effective in the practical forming processes.

It is well known that the quality and efficiency of the design of metal forming processes can be significantly improved with the aid of effective numerical simulations. In the present study, a two-and three-dimensional finite element simulation system, CAMP form, was developed for the analysis of metal forming processes in the PC environment. It is composed of a solver based on the thermo-rigid-viscoplastic approach and graphic user interface (GUI) based pre-and post-processors to be used for the effective description of forming conditions and graphic display of simulation results, respectively. In particular, in the case of CAMPform 2D (two-dimensional), as the solver contains an automatic remeshing module which determines the deformation step when remeshing is required and reconstructs the new mesh system, it is possible to carry out simulations automatically without any user intervention. Also, the forming analysis considers ductile fracture of the workpiece and wear of dies for better usage of the system. In the case of CAMPform 3D, general three-dimensional problems that involve complex die geometries and require remeshing can be analyzed, but full automation of simulations has yet to be achieved. In this paper, the overall structure and computational background of CAMPform will be briefly explained and analysis results of several forming processes will be shown. From the current results, it is construed that CAMPform can be used in providing useful information to assist the design of forming processes.

This paper is concerned with the family of parts that generally feature a central hub with radial protrusions. Radial Extrusion is usually used in order to produce complex parts, which is combined with upsetting and/or forward and backward extrusion. Typical parts that fall into this category include cross pieces for universal joints, key-shaft type parts, tube fittings, and differential gears. In this paper, the forming characteristics of radial extrusion combined with forward extrusion is investigated by comparing the punch and mandrel loads. The design factors during radial extrusion combined with forward extrusion are applied to the simulation to see how much those factors have effect on the forming loads. The rigid-plastic FEM is applied to the simulation.

Tube hydroforming is recently drawing attention of automotive industries due to its seberal advantages over conventional methods. It can produce wide range of products such as subframes, engine cradles, and exhaust manifolds with cheaper production cost by reducing overall number of processes. Tube hydroforming process is divided into prebending process and hydroforming process. Tube bending ins an important factor of the hydroforming process to enable the tube to be placed in the die cavity. This paper presents the theoretical analysis and the simulation results of the tube bending process. With some assumptions, approximate equations are derived to predict the thickness distribution on the cross section and the spring back of the bent tube. Bending simulations are carried out and compared to the analytical and experimental results.

In this study, optimization for press forming condition of low arm was performed with explicit dynamic FEM code, Pam-Stamp. FEM simulation was coupled with the Taguchi's experiment technique having three design variables - friction coefficient, plastic anisotropy parameter, and blank shape - which are chosen to be optimized. The simulation results were compared with those of experiment. We found out the change of blank shape among these three design variables is very effective in optimizing press forming condition of low arm. In addition, the modified blank shape shows high yield of slitting coil.

The conventional and new forging processes of the power steering worm blank are analyzed by the rigid-plastic finite element method. The conventional process contains three stages such as indentation, extrusion and upsetting, which was designed by a forming equipment expert. Process conditions such as reduction in area, semi-die angle and upsetting ratio are considered to prevent internal or geometrical defects. The results of simulation of the conventional forging process are summarized in terms of deformation patterns, load-stroke relationships and die pressures for each forming operation. Based on the simulation results of the current three-stage, the power steering worm blank forging process for improving the conventional process sequence is designed. Die pressures and forming loads of proposed process are within limit value which is proposed by experts and the proposed process is found to be proper for manufacturing the power steering worm blank.

A dynamic explicit finite element code for simulating sheet forming processes has been developed. The code utilizes the discrete Kirchhoff shell element and contact force is treated by a conventional penalty method. In order to reduce the computational cost, a new and robust contact searching algorithm has been developed and implemented into the code. In the method, a hierarchical structure of tool segments is built for each tool at the initial stage of the analysis. hierarchical structure is built in a way to divide a box to 8 sub-boxes, 2 in each direction, until the lowest level of the hierarchical structure contains exactly one segment of the tool or empty. Then at each time step, contact is checked from the box to sub-boxes hierarchically for each node. Comparisons of computational results of various examples with the existing ones show the validity of the method.

Optimization of the process parameters is carried out for process design in sheet metal forming processes. The scheme incorporates with a rigid-plastic finite element method for the deformation analysis and response surface methodology for the optimum searching of process parameters. The algorithm developed is applied to design of the draw bead force and the die radius in deep drawing processes of rectangular cups. The present algorithm shows the capability of designing process parameters which enable the prevention of the weak part of fracture during processes.

Recent developments of Fe technology make it possible to apply CAD/CAE/CAM techniques successfully to the stamping die design among the automotive parts industries. Those successful applications are greatly attributable to the development of commercial S/W. Up to now most commercial S/W for the analysis of sheet metal forming is based on the dynamic explicit algorithm. The main characteristics of dynamic explicit algorithm is that there is no convergence problem if the time increment is taken less than the stability limit. The stability of the analysis is guaranteed in the commercial code, since the adequate time increment is computed from the so called "Courant Condition". However excess computing time is often pointed out in the dynamic explicit analysis according to the characteristics of process parameters taken. In the study, various parameters that may affect the stability and the method how to improve computational efficiency of analysis have been investigated.estigated.

An inverse finite element approach is employed to efficiently design the optimum blank shape and intermediate shapes from the desired final shape in multi-stage elliptic cup drawing processes. The multi-stage deep-drawing process is difficult to design with the conventional finite element analysis since the process is very complicate with the conventional finite element analysis since the process is very complicated with intermediate shapes and the numerical analysis undergoes the convergence problem even with tremendous computing time. The elliptic cup drawing process needs much effort to design sine it requires full three-dimensional analysis. The inverse analysis is able to omit all complicated and tedious analysis procedures for the optimum process design. In this paper, the finite element inverse analysis provides the thickness strain distribution of each intermediate shape through the multi-stage analysis. The multi-stage analysis deals with the convergence among intermediate shapes and the corresponding sliding constraint surfaces that are described by the analytic function of merged-arc type surfaces.

Finite element analysis is carried out for simulation of the multi-stage elliptic cup drawing process with the large aspect ratio. The analysis incorporates with shell elements for an elasto-plastic finite element method with the explicit time integration scheme. For the simulation, LS-DYNA3D is utilized for its wide capability of solving forming problems. The simulation result shows that the non-uniform drawing ratio at the elliptic cross section ad the small shoulder radius cause failure such as tearing and wrinkling. The result suggests the guideline to modify the tool shape for prevention of the failure during the drawing process.