Recent developments in sheet hydroforming technology

In this paper, recent developments in sheet hydroforming technology are summarized, several key technical problems to be solved for the development of sheet hydroforming technology are analyzed, and varied sheet hydroforming technologies are discussed. Compound deformation by drawing and bulging is the main direction for the development of sheet hydroforming technology, in which it is advantageous to increase the feeding of materials, and the ratio of drawing deformation (drawing in of the blank flange) to bulging, enabling the forming limit of a sheet blank to be increased. It is also advantageous to increase the local deformation capacity for sheet hydroforming, to increase the range of application of the process. Press capacity is one of the important factors restraining the range of applications. As one of the flexible forming technologies that is still under development, it has much potential for innovative applications. Its applications have been increasing remarkably, recently in automotive companies. A breakthrough in the technology will be obtained by the development of novel equipment. A new sheet hydroforming technology using a movable die is proposed in this paper, which has been developed recently by the authors. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.