This article addresses process, stamping, and manufacturing engineers, as well as tool designers (prototype and series production tools), and press shop planners in the range of metal forming. The paper deals with methods of modelling and simulating the metal forming process and their application in product design, production, and forming process planning. In models usually applied major effects on the forming process are neglected. For instance, the elastic behaviour of presses and die tools is not considered in process and tool planning. Thus, reworking of tools is a consequence of this model oversimplification. The paper illustrates how interactions between forming press, die tool and metal forming processes can be modelled by enhancing conventional FE models. Several examples demonstrate the information value of the Advanced Forming Process Model (AFPM).Keywords: simulation of forming process, digital simulation of behaviour, virtual press, advanced forming process model, AFPM

The paper presents a brief history of ring rolling development at the Dresden University of Technology (DUT) from the 70s to the present. The technological scope covers the techniques explored at the DUT: Tangential profile ring rolling, axial profile tube rolling/roll plunging and the TRENPRO® method to produce shaped rings. Starting from the state of the art, technological principle, range of application and machine‐oriented implementation of these techniques are described. Furthermore, other common ring rolling variants, such as axial profile ring rolling, skew‐rolling and radial‐axial ring rolling, are taken into consideration. Finally, the authors provide a summary of problems still to be solved and ways to refine and disseminate the “ring rolling” discipline, assessing the rolling methods’ potential as extremely forward‐looking.

Although today's deep drawing tools are thoroughly designed and calculated by means of computeraided design (CAD), finite element (FE) simulation and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), the sequence of operations to put a tool into production still encompasses manual and irreproducible labor. In particular, the die spotting is empirical and is almost entirely dependent on the toolmaker's experience. This fine-tuning of the drawing tool consumes a large amount of time. In minimizing manual die spotting, a large potential to decrease time and costs exists. This article presents error compensation methods to create deep drawing tools, which require less manual die spotting in order to produce sound quality stampings. In FE simulations of deep drawing operations, it is general practice to assume rigid tool and press properties. The fact that die and punch design are based on these simplifications might be one of the main causes that empirical die spotting is still imperative. Therefore, the authors developed a methodology to compensate the tool face for effects of elastic press and tool deformations, which occur under applied process load. The authors demonstrate the static compensation with two examples. The first shows the static compensation for ram tilting caused by an unbalanced load, which can originate from asymmetric part design and/or eccentric mounted tools. The second example describes the compensation for elastic die deformation caused by local and global deflections. In either case, the compensated die face, under applied process load, deformed into the desired die face. This research work shows the potential and limits of a static compensation for effects of elastic tool and press deformations on the final shape of the stamping.

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