A study of the optimization of sheet metal drawing with active drawbeads

An experimental study is described in which active draw- bead technology is used to attempt to optimize the sheet metal forming process. Oval AA 6111-T4 panels were drawn in a series of tests using various drawbead trajectories to establish the feasibility of the approach. The selection of drawbead trajectory was shown to have a dramatic effect on maximum attainable draw depth at fracture. Increasing draw- bead penetration from zero to 5 mm in the early stages of the drawing process and retracting midway through the draw resulted in a 40% increase in draw depth compared to using a fixed 5 mm penetration. In the second part of the investigation, active drawbead technology was used to study its effect on highly nonsymmetric panel forming. Drawing limit curves in terms of drawbead depth versus blankholder forces (BHF) were plotted, and different drawbead trajectories were tested to determine an optimal drawbead trajectory scheme. A corresponding finite element model was also created. The results of strain path analysis successfully support the experiments