Junying Min

Constitutive model of friction stir weld with consideration of its inhomogeneous mechanical properties

In practical engineering, finite element(FE) modeling for weld seam is commonly simplified by neglecting its inhomogeneous mechanical properties. This will cause a significant loss in accuracy of FE forming analysis, in particular, for friction stir welded(FSW) blanks due to the large width and good formability of its weld seam. The inhomogeneous mechanical properties across weld seam need to be well characterized for an accurate FE analysis. Based on a similar AA5182 FSW blank, the metallographic observation and micro-Vickers hardness analysis upon the weld cross-section are performed to identify the interfaces of different sub-zones, i.e., heat affected zone(HAZ), thermal-mechanically affected zone(TMAZ) and weld nugget(WN). Based on the rule of mixture and hardness distribution, a constitutive model is established for each sub-zone to characterize the inhomogeneous mechanical properties across the weld seam. Uniaxial tensile tests of the AA5182 FSW blank are performed with the aid of digital image correlation(DIC) techniques. Experimental local stress-strain curves are obtained for different weld sub-zones. The experimental results show good agreement with those derived from the constitutive models, which demonstrates the feasibility and accuracy of these models. The proposed research gives an accurate characterization of inhomogeneous mechanical properties across the weld seam produced by FSW, which provides solutions for improving the FE simulation accuracy of FSW sheet forming.

Advances in characterization of sheet metal forming limits

This paper accounts for nonlinear strain path, sheet curvature, and sheet-tool contact pressure to explain the differences in measured forming limit curves (FLCs) obtained by Marciniak and Nakajima Tests. While many engineers working in the sheet metal forming industry use the raw data from one or the other of these tests without consideration that they reflect the convolution of material properties with the complex processing conditions involved in these two tests, the method described in this paper has the objective to obtain a single FLC for onset of necking for perfectly linear strain paths in the absence of through-thickness pressure and restricted to purely in-plane stretching conditions, which is proposed to reflect a true material property. The validity of the result is checked using a more severe test in which the magnitude of the nonlinearity, curvature, and pressure are doubled those involved in the Nakajima Test.

Comparison of DIC Methods of Determining Necking Limit of PLC Material

Digital image correlation (DIC) techniques have been used in forming limit tests to obtain forming limit strains and many different methods have been proposed to determine the onset of localized necking in order to improve the accuracy of forming limit curves in recent ten years. In this work, necking limit strains of a PLC material (AA5182-O) was determined by the DIC strain rate contours as well as the existing DIC methods in the literature. The effect of PLC band propagation on identification the onset of localized necking was discussed.