Optimized decision of the exact material modes in the simulation for the innovative sheet hydroforming method

Although sheet hydroforming has gained increasing interest in the world, it is difficult to determine the optimal forming parameters in FEM due to the incorrect application of material property parameters. In this paper, the properties of the material used in sheet hydroforming were obtained to meet the reality based on the identification of parameters for constitutive models by inverse modelling in which the friction coefficients were also considered. With consideration of identified simulation parameters by inverse modelling, some key process parameters including tool dimensions and pre-bulging on the forming processes in sheet hydroforming were investigated and optimized. The paper shows that the results from simulation based on the identified parameters were in good agreement with those from experiment.