• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.50 no.4
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• pp.563-573
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• 2014

In hydroforming, the general technique employed to overcome the problem of die corner filling consist in increasing the maximum fluid pressure during the forming process. This technique, in other hand, leads to other difficulties such as thinning and rupturing of the final work piece. In this paper, a new technique has been suggested in order to produce a part with complete filled corners. In this approach, two moveable bushes have been used. So, the workpiece moves driven by both bushes simultaneously. In the first stage, system pressure increases until a maximum of 15 MPa, providing aninitial tube bulge. The results showed that the pressure in this stage have to be limited to 17 MPa to avoid fracture. In a second stage, bushes are moved keeping the constant initial pressure. The punches act simultaneously at the die extremities. Results show that the friction between part and die decreases during the forming process significantly. Also, by using this technique it is possible to produce a part with reasonable uniform thickness distribution. Other outcomes of applying this method are the lower pressures required to manufacture a workpiece with complete filled corners with no wrinkling.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2005.10a
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• pp.239-242
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• 2005

In the roll forming, a flat strip is progressively deformed by feeding it through a series of rotating rolls. There are various layouts for the tube toll-forming stages. The process sequences are as follows: leveling, roll-forming, welding, bead removing, seam annealing, cooling, sizing and cutting. Electric resistance welded(ERW) tubes have been widely used for the machinery parts, especially for hydroformed automotive parts. However conventional ERW tubes do not have a high formability because of hardening of welded portion by rapid cooling. Moreover the decrease in thickness of the welded portion during the grinding of the inner and outer bead may reduce the formability of the tube. In case of applying the tubular parts without grinding the bead, the flow of the fluid can be prevented due to the turbulent flow induced by the inner bead. In attempt to determine the optimal bead grinding amount in the roll forming process, in the present paper, the effects of the removal depth and width of the inner beads on the hydroformability are analyzed by the finite element simulation.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.86-92
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• 2008

Recently, the use of tubes in the manufacturing of the automobile parts has increased and therefore many automotive manufactures have tried to use hydro-forming technology. The hydro-forming technology may cause many advantages to automotive applications in terms of better structural integrity of the parts, lower cost from fewer part count, material saving, weight reduction, lower spring-back, improved strength and durability and design flexibility. In this study, the whole process of front engine cradle (or front sub-frame) parts development by tube hydro-forming using steel material having tensile strength of 440MPa grade is presented. At the part design stage, it requires feasibility study and process design aided by CAE (Computer Aided Design) to confirm hydro-formability in details. Effects of parameters such as internal pressure, axial feeding and geometry shape on automotive sub-frame by hydro-forming process were carefully investigated. Overall possibility of hydro-formable sub-frame parts could be examined by cross sectional analyses. Moreover, it is essential to ensure the formability of tube material on every forming step such as pre-bending, preforming and hydro-forming. At the die design stage, all the components of prototyping tools are designed and interference with press is examined from the point of geometry and thinning.