Incremental forming with elastomer base for aluminum alloy sheet product with vertical wall

Abstract

Incremental forming is generally governed by the sine law and can not produce vertical walls. On the other hand, the incremental forming technology of a new style has been developed which is operated using a general-purpose elastomer base without instead of a blank support die. On this process, the step generated on the outer side of the blank sheet is moved by the bar tool like the motion of edge dislocation on the slip plane. In this operation, elements of material on the blank sheet can be delivered to the product by the bar tool going around the product. This means that this process can build a vertical wall by getting out of the sine law. By applying this technology, we attempted to form vertical wall products simulating a battery case. Forming examination has been conducted using blank sheet of aluminum alloy 5052-O. As a result, the products were created successfully, and the deformation properties were observed. In addition, square and dodecagonal double tubes formed successfully by using this process.