Investigations and approaches on material flow of non-uniform arranged cavities in sheet bulk metal forming processes

To encounter new challenges regarding the economic an ecological aspects of the forming of functional components, sheet bulk metal forming has been introduced as a new approach. An important aspect for the successful use of such processes is the control of the complex material flow. At the moment there is knowledge on the material flow in uniform arranged cavities, as well as on possibilities which enable its control. However there is no data on the behavior of the material flow in non-uniform arranged cavities and on the usefulness of established flow control methods. The simulated experiments in this paper, which are based on a validated model, reveal that there are significant and interactive effects of combination and type of the chosen geometry of the cavities. Furthermore, a local modification of friction factor shows a significant influence on the form filling which however differs in part from previous findings. (C) 2014 Publsihed by Elsevier Ltd.