Modeling of material deformation behavior in micro-forming under consideration of individual grain heterogeneity

This study aims to develop a model to characterize the inhomogeneous material deformation behavior in micro-forming.First,the influence of individual grain heterogeneity on the deformation behavior of CuZn20 foils was investigated via tensile and micro-hardness tests.The results showed that different from thick sheets,the hardening behavior of grains in the deformation area of thin foils is not uniform.The flow stress of thin foils actually only reflects the average hardening behavior of several easy-deformation-grains,which is the reason that thinner foils own smaller flow stress.Then,a composite modeling method under consideration of individual grain heterogeneity was developed,where the effects of grain orientation and shape are quantitatively represented by the method of flow stress classification and Voronoi tessellation,respectively.This model provides an accurate and effective method to analyze the influence of individual grain heterogeneity on the deformation behavior of the micro-sized material.

Deformation behavior of materials in micro-forming with consideration of intragranular heterogeneities

To describe the relationship between the whole material deformation behavior and each grain deformation behavior inmicro-forming,experimental and numerical modelling methods were employed.Tensile test results reveal that contrary to the valueof flow stress,the scatter of flow stress decreases with the increase of thickness-to-grain diameter(T/d)ratio.Microhardnessevaluation results show that each grain owns unique deformation behavior and randomly distributes in each specimen.The specimenwith less number of grains would be more likely to form an easy deformation zone and produce the concentration of plasticdeformation.Based on the experiment results,a size-dependent model considering the effects of grain size,geometry size,and thedeformation behavior of each grain was developed.And the effectiveness and practicability of the size-dependent model wereverified by experimental results.

Material flow behavior modeling with consideration of size effects

Size effects make traditional forming theories infeasible in analyzing the micro-forming process, so it is necessary to develop an accurate material model to describe the material flow behavior with consideration of size effects. By studying the size effects of the flow behavior of H80 foils experimentally, it is found that the foil flow stress and strain hardening ability reduce significantly with the decrease of foil thickness. The reduction of the proportion of internal grains which own complete grain boundaries is the main cause of size effects of foil flow behavior. Moreover, grain refinement can reduce the size effects on material flow behavior. On these bases, a phenomenological material model has been developed to mathematically describe the material flow behavior with consideration of the effects of geometry size, grain size and strain hardening behavior. The reasonability and accuracy of this new model are verified by comparing the calculation values with experimental results in metal foil tensile and micro-bulk upsetting experiments. These experimental results and the proposed model lay a solid foundation for understanding and further exploring the material flow behavior in the micro-forming process.

Size effects on springback behavior of H80 foils

Size effects make traditional bending theories infeasible in analyzing the springback behavior of H80 foils in the similarity bending experiment. It is observed that there is a certain critical thickness value, which divides the change trend of springback amount of foils into two opposite parts. In order to reveal the reason for size effects on the springback behavior of H80 foils, the method of hardness increment characterization was applied to describe the deformation distribution of foils. The competition between strengthening effect of geometrically necessary dislocations and weakening effect of surface grains determines the change trend of springback amount with foil thickness. When the thickness of foils is large, the weakening effects dominate the material behavior, resulting in that the springback amount decreases with the decrease in foil thickness. However, when the foil thickness is small, the strengthening effects dominate the springback tendency, leading to a sharp increase in the springback amount. Furthermore, the deformation distribution is disturbed due to the enhanced effects of individual grain heterogeneity with the decrease in the thickness of foils, leading to the large scatter of springback angle after unloading.

Tensile properties and fractographs of Ti–2.5Al–1.5Mn foils at different temperatures

The tensile properties and fractographs of Ti- 2.5Al-1.5Mn foils at different temperatures were investi- gated. It is observed that material properties closely cor- relate with the thickness （T） to grain size （d） ratio and deformation temperature. Tensile analysis shows that local deformation is the main deformation feature in foils forming at room temperature, which may lead to premature fracture. The causes of inhomogeneous deformation behavior are the limited number of deformable grains contained in deformation zone and the weak transferability of hardening among different grains. Fracture analysis reveals that the size of dimples can represent the ductility of foils at room temperature. With the further increase of deformation temperature, the main plastic deformation mode of foils is transformed from intragranular disloca- tions and twin crystal to grain-boundary gliding and roll- ing. In conclusion, foil forming at elevated temperature can increase the hardening transferability and the number of deformable grains in deformation zone, which is an effective method to improve the formability and reduce the scatter of material properties.