Abstract
In plastic forming simulations in which tools are assumed to be rigid, generally a tool normal at a tool node is calculated by averaging the normals defined on all adjacent elements to achieve the continuity of the normals. Moreover, a tool normal at an arbitrary point is defined by interpolation, thus differing from the one defined by the cross product of tangent vectors to the discretized surface. However, most of the conventional studies use the cross product of tangent vectors as the definition of the tool normal to discretize the change of the tool normals. This report describes a new algorithm for the discretization of the change of the tool normal based on the "averaged" tool normal. Hat bending simulation was performed and the results showed that the proposed algorithm improved the accuracy of the simulation.
