HYDROFORMING OF SHEET METAL WITH A

MOVABLE DIE COMPONENT

Xu Yi  Zhou Lixin  Zhang Shihong

(Institute of Metal Research,
Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016)

Wang Zhongtang

(Department of Material Science and Engineering, Shenyang Institute of Technology, Shenyang 110016)

Abstract: A modified sheet hydroforming process is investigated experimentally and numerically, the female die is movable and can keep in contact with the deformed area of the sheet blank so that further deformation on the deformed area is decreased. The flange of the sheet blank can be drawn in with a suitable sealing method, therefore the hydroformed part has less thinning than hydrobulge formed only part, the limit drawing ratio of the sheet can be remarkably increased. The explicit finite element method is used to analyze the hydroforming process of the sheet parts. Various process parameters are tried to investigate their effects on the deformation of the sheet blanks. The effects of contacting force act on the experimental results.

Key words: Movable die  Sheet metal forming   Hydroforming

CLC No: TG156

国家自然科学基金资助项目(10377017). Received 20030122, received in revised form 20030717