Introduction

Sheet

metal forming is

one of the most

widely used

manufacturing

processes for

the fabrication

of a wide range of products in many industries. The reason behind sheet metal forming gaining a lot

of attention in modern technology is due to the ease with which metal may be formed into useful

shapes by plastic deformation processes in which the volume and mass of the metal are conserved

and metal is displaced from one location to another.

Deep drawing is one of the extensively used sheet metal forming processes in the industries

to have mass production of cup shaped components in a very short time. In deep drawing, a flat

blank of sheet metal is shaped by the action of a punch forcing the metal into a die cavity. Deep

drawing products in modern industries usually have a complicated shape, so these have to undergo

several successive operations to obtain a final desired shape.

1. Work piece material / Blank

2. Tooling

3. Interface

4. Deformation zone

5. Equipment

6. Part

7. Environment

In today’s industry applications, Finite Element Method (FEM) is commonly used in order

to simulate different processes based on different FE analyses. In Volvo Cars Corporation

particularly, the metal forming process and the crash process, among others, are regularly simulated

to lower costs in an early construction phase and to evaluate real physical processes in a later

construction phase.

The metal forming FE analysis is used to simulate production of car components and to

develop the corresponding dies. Usually, the physical process involves many iterative steps, but the

final result could be seen only during and after the prototype production. Using forming

simulations, these steps can be done in a faster and cheaper way.

Literature Review

STRETCHING: The material is expanded in both directions. This mode of deformation is found

mostly on smooth bottoms of shallow parts and in hydroforming processes.

DRAWING: This mode is typical the material flow from the flange towards the inner part of the

die.

BENDING/UNBENDING: This is a cyclic deformation (most often associated with

plane strain). It is found on the die entry line as well as in drawbeads.

STRETCH-AND-BEND: This mode is associated to flanging operations for which

the bending line is concave.

COMPRESSION-AND-BEND: This mode is associated to flanging operations for which

the bending line is convex.