scholarly journals Recent Advances in the Laser Forming Process: A Review

Metals ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 1472
Author(s):  
Mehdi Safari ◽  
Ricardo Alves de Sousa ◽  
Jalal Joudaki

Laser forming is an emerging manufacturing process capable of producing either uncomplicated and complicated shapes by employing a concentrated heating source. The heat source movement creates local softening, and a plastic strain will be induced during the rise of temperature and the subsequent cooling. This contactless forming process may be used for the simple bending of sheets and tubes or fabrication of doubly-curved parts. Different studies have been carried out over recent years to understand the mechanism of forming and predicting the bending angle. The analysis of process parameters and search for optimized manufacturing conditions are among the most discussed topics. This review describes the main recent findings in the laser forming of single and multilayer sheets, composite and fiber-metal laminate plates, force assisted laser bending, tube bending by laser beam, the optimization technique implemented for process parameters selection and control, doubly-curved parts, and the analytical solutions in laser bending. The main focus is set to the researches published since 2015.

2019 ◽  
Vol 969 ◽  
pp. 552-557
Author(s):  
Kuntal Maji

Fabricating three dimensional shaped surfaces from flat sheet metals by laser forming, both out-of-plane and in-plane deformations are required. This article presents the modeling of coupling mechanism activated laser forming of sheet metals based on experimental data for prediction and optimization of bending and thickening deformations. Experiments were performed based on a central composite design of experiments on coupling mechanism based laser metal forming process considering the input process parameters like laser power, scan speed and spot diameter, bending and thickening were taken as the outputs. Neural network and neuro-fuzzy system-based models were developed to carry out both forward and inverse modeling of the laser metal forming process under the coupling mechanism. Multi-objective optimization based on the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm was used to obtain multiple optimal solutions to achieve different amounts of out-of-plane and in-plane deformations. The proposed method could guide for a suitable selection of the process parameters to produce three-dimensional shapes utilizing coupling mechanism-based laser forming using multiple laser line heating.


2013 ◽  
Vol 670 ◽  
pp. 101-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jin Hui Liu ◽  
W.J. Xie ◽  
C. Zhao ◽  
L. Zhang ◽  
Z.L. Lu

Generally, pressures resulted from roller during leveling process in selective laser sintering has the effect of densification of powder materials. But extra frictions due to them become the forces which always deteriorate the surface of the part and mark it with several lines trace. Sometimes, the manufacturing can even not continue if these forces accumulate to a large extent to move the whole part. Therefore, the whole forming process will be obliged to stop owing to the displacement of part from above mentioned damage. In this work, the emerging reason and related variation factors of these forces were studied mathematically, the mathematical and physical model of friction force was also built to describe the connections between the leveling process parameters and them. How to control the influence factor of friction to abate their damages to surfaces and promote the forming quality were also discussed based on these models. This will provide a common reference for the application of selective laser sintering technology.


2008 ◽  
Vol 141-143 ◽  
pp. 85-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ji Ming Zhou ◽  
Le Hua Qi ◽  
Jun Tao Guan

Many process parameters are involved during the fabrication of Csf/Mg composites using extrusion directly following vacuum infiltration. The selection of suitable process parameters is important for the successful fabrication of composites. This will require a continuous monitoring and collecting system of process parameters. This paper describes how this is performed. The monitoring and collecting system is developed to monitor and control the forming process successfully. The hardware was built with data acquisition (DAQ) card based on PCI and various sensors for temperature, pressure, displacement. The industrial computer is used to process the data collected from the sensors. The data acquisition card is the bridge between the computer and sensors. In order to reduce the signal noise from sensors, the hardware filter circuit is designed. The data acquisition card can not work by connecting the computer and sensors through it simply. It must be operated through the self-developed software. The data colletcing software is developed in this paper. It can realize the parameter monitoring and collecting easily by setting up the hardware through the user friendly interface. The curves of parameters can be displayed on the computer screen and the data can be saved into the database for post-processing. The software also supplies the warning function. When the parameters (for example the temperature of mold) arrives the set value, the computer can sound a note of warning to tell the worker to operate the press. It is demonstrated that the main parameters, such as temperature of mold and liquid metal, the loaded pressure and the displacement of punch, can be monitored and collected in real-time by use of this system. This paper found the base for the further selection of optimized process parameters.


Author(s):  
Alfonso Paoletti

Laser bending is a promising technique utilised in order to deform metal sheets that offers the advantage of requiring no hard tooling and no external forces, thus reducing cost and increasing flexibility. Laser forming involves a complex interaction of many process parameters, ranging from those connected with the irradiation of the laser beam to those regarding the thermal and mechanical properties of the workpiece material. The present work is focused on the laser bending of AISI 304 steel sheets by using of a diode laser. The influence of process parameters, such as the power of laser beam and the scanning speed as well as the metal sheet thickness on the bending angle has been taken into account. The investigation has also analysed the effect of rolling direction of the metal sheets and the conditions of cooling on the bending process.


2015 ◽  
Vol 639 ◽  
pp. 115-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Griffiths ◽  
Mike J.W. Riley ◽  
Ghazal Sheikholeslami ◽  
Stuart P. Edwardson ◽  
Geoff Dearden

Laser forming or bending is fast becoming an attractive option for the forming of advanced high strength steels (AHSS), due primarily to the reduced formability of AHSS when compared with conventional steels in traditional contact-based forming processes. An inherently iterative process, laser forming must be optimized for efficiency in order to compete with contact based forming processes; as such, a robust and accurate method of optimal process parameter prediction is required. In this paper, goal driven optimization is conducted, utilizing numerical simulations as the basis for the prediction of optimal process parameters for the laser bending of DP 1000 steel. A key consideration of the optimization process is the requirement for minimal micro-structural transformation in automotive grade high strength steels such as DP 1000.


Author(s):  
Paramasivan Kalvettukaran ◽  
Sandip Das ◽  
Sundar Marimuthu ◽  
Dipten Misra

The laser bending process, also called the laser forming process, consists of irradiating the surface of a sheet or a plate by means of a moving laser beam with a predefined scanning strategy to generate the desired shape through thermally induced residual stress. This chapter presents the mechanisms of a laser bending process and the technological aspects concerning laser v-bending of rectangular AISI 304 plates for full plates and plates with a central cutout at its middle to highlight the process fundamentals and how processing affects the final bending angle of the workpieces. Laser bending involving plates with a cutout will have numerous applications for car bodies, such as front and rear panels where bending is required to be performed on panels with cutout geometries. To investigate the effects of shape and size of the cutout on temperature distribution, stress distribution, and final bending angle, different shapes such as circular, ellipse, rectangular, and square, as well as different dimensions of cutouts have been chosen.


2011 ◽  
Vol 317-319 ◽  
pp. 170-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiao Xun Zhang ◽  
Yun Hua Sun ◽  
Ye Ling Zhu

Prediction and control of the microstructure to improve product performance are very important for the industry practice. In this study, microstructure evolutions of 30Cr2Ni4MoV steel under different conditions were simulated by changing the process parameters using the Deform 3D software. Effects of the forming process parameters on the microstructure were revealed: (1) the higher the temperature and the lower the strain rate, the smaller the strain are needed for the dynamic recrystallization; (2) when strain is enough, the higher the strain rate, the easier the uniform and small grain size can be obtained; (3) under a certain strain rate, the grain size increases as the deformation temperature increases. The microstructure of metal can be predicted and controlled according to the effects of hot forming process parameters on the microstructure evolution.


2008 ◽  
Vol 575-578 ◽  
pp. 1145-1150
Author(s):  
Ying Jin ◽  
Jian Hua Wu ◽  
Yong Jun Shi ◽  
Hong Shen ◽  
Zheng Qiang Yao

Laser forming of a micro-structural element involves a complex thermoplastic process. Numerous efforts had been made on the mechanisms of laser forming for macro-size elements, such as temperature gradient mechanism, buckling mechanism and upsetting mechanism, etc. It is found that the three mechanisms cannot depict fully the process of deformation in the macro-size element forming, let alone meet the needs of the micro-size one. Considering the laser inducing thermal stresses with size factors differing from the conventional analysis, it is essential to reveal the mechanisms dominating the forming process to accurately control the bending angle of a tiny plate. By studying the thermal transfer and elastic-plastic deformation of micro-structural element laser forming, the forming mechanism is explained within the micro size. The finite element model for laser bending is constructed for simulation. The stimulation results are agreement with the experimental data.


2021 ◽  
Vol 1135 (1) ◽  
pp. 012006
Author(s):  
Georgi Nikolaev Nikolov ◽  
Anders Noel Thomsen ◽  
Morten Kristiansen

Abstract Laser forming is a contactless thermal forming process that can be applied for both single and double-curved geometries. When it comes to prototyping and small batch production, laser forming has the potential to compete with conventional sheet-metal forming processes; however, an investigation of the relationship between process parameters, hardness distribution and the bend rate is lacking. This study examines the influence of using different sets of processing parameters on the bend rate and the hardness distribution. ANSI 304 stainless steel samples of 1 and 3 mm thickness are laser formed up to 90° with a bend radius equal to their thickness. A theoretical discussion of the material’s hardening kinetics is used to generalize the results. Micro-Vickers hardness test is used to measure the hardness distribution along the 3 mm samples to support the theoretical discussion. The results show that the bend rate increases when using different sets of process parameters; furthermore, the bend arc length has shown to have a significant influence over the bend rate. An increase of hardness is observed on the bottom side of the laser formed samples, indicating potential strain hardening.


Metals ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 883 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Safari ◽  
Ricardo Alves de Sousa ◽  
Jalal Joudaki

Laser forming is a powerful tool for fabricating complicated shapes economically. The pattern of laser movement (irradiating scheme) has an essential effect on the shaped form. In this article, the forming of a saddle-shaped surface will be investigated experimentally by the laser forming process. A spiral irradiating scheme is implemented to manufacture a saddle-shaped surface. The main idea of this study is the investigation of the simultaneous variations of the process parameters and their effect on the curvature of the final part. The process parameters of the study are the spiral pitch, number of spiral passes, and movement pattern (In-to-Out or reversely Out-to-In scanning path). The response surface methodology is selected for experimentation. The measurement of the deformation results shows that the deformations of laser-formed saddle-shaped surfaces decrease with an increase in the spiral pitch of the path. Additionally, the deformations of the saddle-shaped surface increase by increasing the number of spiral passes. The results demonstrate that the pattern movement has little effect on the deformations of laser-formed saddle-shaped surfaces and an Out-to-In spiral pattern movement is advised. At last, the proper input variables to obtain the maximum value of displacements for the saddle point are determined (10 mm spiral pitch, three spiral passes, and Out-to-In pattern movement).


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