Bending processing and mechanism of laser forming pure aluminum metal foam

Abstract

Laser forming of pure aluminum closed-cell foam has been studied by means of an effective and cellular model, and the results are compared with experiments and numerical simulations. In order to reveal the forming process and bending mechanism during the process of laser forming closed-cell foam aluminum, a simulation was performed. It is the first time to study the laser forming pure aluminum closed-cell foam aluminum when compared to Al-Si closed-cell foam aluminum. It is found that the bending angle increases with increasing the laser power, and decreases with the increasing scan velocity in the experiment results. The stress/strain profile is similar to that in laser forming Al-Si foam aluminum in simulation results. It is confirmed that temperature gradient mechanism (TGM) is the dominant mechanism during the present laser forming of the closed-cell pure aluminum foam material. And the plastic compressive strain is caused by overall response of the cell wall bending and cell bucking, not by the material shortening.