Formability limits of aluminum sheet metal

Purpose

Advanced experimental method for determining the FLC of sheet aluminum and thereby the formability limits of the material. Our equipment allows testing a wide range of thicknesses (0.1 – 4 mm), temperatures (20 – 600 °C), and punch speeds (5 – 300 mm/s) to obtain accurate material data to use in finite element (FE) simulations of forming procedures where geometry assurance is of essence. The Nakajima tests are performed in a specially designed tool with the possibility of heating the punch, die, and blank holder independently to study the influence of temperature in the formability of the material.

Method

The Nakajima tests are conducted using a hydraulic press with 1200 tons of force capacity at the RISE Stamping and Forming Center located in Olofström, Sweden. The FLC of the material is produced after testing seven different geometries that can be extracted from the sheet in different directions with respect to the rolling direction, for instance, longitudinal (0°), transverse (90°), and diagonal (45°). The deformation and strains of the material are measured using the digital image correlation (DIC) system ARAMIS™, which is an optical three-dimensional (3D) deformation measurement equipment used to obtain the distribution and evolution of strains on the surface of the material during the whole test. The strain measurement range varies between 0.01% and several 100%. For sheet materials with greater variation in their mechanical properties, i.e., recycled aluminum, several repetition tests can be performed to capture the forementioned variation. 

Naturally, if you have any requests beyond our current offer, you are most welcome to get in touch and discuss it with us. We are here to help!

Delivery

According to agreement