On a new concept of rotary draw bend-die adaptable for bending tubes with multiple outer diameters under non-mandrel condition

A traditional rotary draw bending die on the numerically controlled (NC) tube benders or other benders can bend tubes with only one kind of outer diameter. It is difficult for such a situation to meet the requirement of modern manufacturing with characters of much varieties and small batch. The present study proposed a new concept of rotary draw bending die called MDB-Die (Multiple-diameter Bending Die), on which tubes with different outer diameters within a definite range can be bent using the same die by only adjusting the pads inside the die set. Numerical and experimental approaches were employed to investigate the forming process of tubes with different outer diameters when bent on the MDB-Die, especially on the characters of force and elastic-plastic deformation of tube wall, and the effects of groove shapes and bending parameters on the cross-section distortion and wall thinning in the process. Analytical expressions in simple tube bending based on plastic theories given by for calculating the magnitude of stresses, together with the wall thickness change, deviation of the neutral axis, and section flattening, were also used for comparison. The result proved that tubes with different outer diameters (from 18 to 25 mm in the study) can be bent successfully on MDB-Die without degrading the bending quality, i.e., the aspect ratios of section distortion of less than 5% and wall thinning of less than 7.8%.