Investigation of formability of HC380LA material via the TPIF-RL incremental forming method

Abstract

Prototype parts can be produced rapidly and at low cost using the incremental forming method. The most important problem with this method is that it causes undesirable variations in wall thickness. Various methods have been developed to improve the wall thickness distribution of the part resulting from forming. One of these techniques, the rolling blank holder (TPIF-RL) method, was used in this study to form 1 mm-thick HC380LA sheet. The Taguchi experimental design was used to determine optimum levels of each of the parameters (forming force, surface roughness and wall thickness) separately via signal/noise analysis. Gray Relational Analysis was then performed to determine the parameters that optimize surface roughness and wall thickness together. In the study, it was determined that the use of low pressing force increases the wall thickness. As a result, a 6% increase in wall thickness was achieved by using the optimum parameters.