Experimental Investigation on Forming Limit Curve at Elevated Temperature Through Dome and Biaxial Test

Abstract

Abstract The characteristics of metal and materials are very important to design any component so that it should not fail in the life of the service. The properties of the materials are also an important consideration while setting the manufacturing parameters which deforms the raw material to give the design shape without providing any defect or fracture. For centuries the commonly used method to characterize the material is the traditional uniaxial tension test. The standard has been created for this test by American Standard for Testing Materials (ASTM) – E8. This specimen is traditionally been used to test the materials and extract the properties needed for designing and manufacturing. It should be noted that the uniaxial tension test uses one axis to test the material i.e., the material is pulled in one direction to extract the properties. The data acquired from this test found enough for manufacturing operations of simple forming where one axis stretching is dominant. Recently a sudden increase in the usage of automotive vehicles results in sudden increases in fuel consumption which results in an increase in air pollution. To cope up with this challenge federal government is implying the stricter environmental regulation to decrease air pollution. To save from the environmental regulation penalty vehicle industry is researching innovation which would reduce vehicle weight and decrease fuel consumption. Thus, the innovation related to light-weighting is not only an option anymore but became a mandatory necessity to decrease fuel consumption. To achieve this target, the industry has been looking at fabricating components from high strength to ultra-high strength steels or lightweight materials. This need is driven by the requirement of 54 miles per gallon by 2025. In addition, the complexity in design increased where multiple individual parts are eliminated. This integrated complex part needs the complex manufacturing forming operation as well as the process like warm or hot forming for maximum formability. The complex forming process will induce the multi-axial stress states in the part, which is found difficult to predict using conventional tools like tension test material characterization. In many pieces of literature limiting dome height and bulge tests were suggested analyzing these multi-axial stress states. However, these tests limit the possibilities of applying multi-axial loading and resulting stress patterns due to contact surfaces. Thus, a test machine called biaxial test is devised which would provide the capability to test the specimen in multi-axial stress states with varying load. In this paper, two processes, limiting dome test and biaxial test were experimented to plot the forming limit curve. The forming limit curve serves the tool for the design of die for manufacturing operation. For experiments, the cruciform test specimens were used in both limiting dome test and biaxial test and tested at elevated temperatures. The forming limit curve from both tests was plotted and compared. In addition, the strain path, forming, and formability was investigated and the difference between the tests was provided.