Application of multi criteria decision making methods to select sheet hydroforming process parameters

The present study endeavors to show an application of the multi objective optimization on the basis of ratio analysis (MOORA) method and technique for order performance by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) method to select optimal process parameters in sheet hydroforming process. The right choice of the process parameters is critical to produce a final part with proper quality. In order to meet this characteristic, the important properties are the cup final thickness (FT), required forming force (FF) and radial stress (RS) at cup wall region. Nine alternatives for selecting the process parameters were taken into consideration based on Taguchi L9 orthogonal array. The limit drawing ratio (LDR), maximum pressure and prebulge pressure were selected as input variables. To solve the problem of process parameters’ selection, the two mentioned methods were used. A compromised weighting approach composed of Entropy and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) methods were used to weight all criteria. The alternatives ranking were performed using MOORA and TOPSIS methods and then the results were compared. The results achieved in both of the assessment represent that the alternative number 3, leads to the best multi performance features of the process among the 9 experiments. In this experiment LDR is 1.81, maximum pressure and prebulge pressure are 37 MPa and 15 MPa, respectively.