A coupled thermal-mechanical and microstructural simulation of the cross wedge rolling process and experimental verification

Some research progresses of the cross wedge rolling (CWR) technique were summarized in this paper. Firstly, a parameterized die design system for CWR has been developed based on the expertise experiences, in which the optimized selection of the key factors of dies can be achieved automatically. Secondly, some empirical equations for recrystallization evolutions and transformation used in the simulation were obtained using the Gleeble-3500 thermomechanical simulator. Finally, using the die design system, a three-dimensional (3D) solid model was generated and imported into the finite element analysis software. Then, by the aid of the microstructural evolution models established, a 3D non-linear finite element model for modeling the CWR process was developed with the thermal, mechanical and microstructural phenomena coupled. Through simulation, the distributions of different field-variables, such as strains, temperature and grain size and so on, were obtained. Compared the calculated results with experimental data, the consistency is demonstrated. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.