Experimental Study of Incremental Sheet Forming Process using CPTi

Many sheet forming processes such hammering and spinning, have been used in manufacturing industry for many decades and consequently have strengths and weakness that are well understood. In contrast Incremental Sheet Forming (ISF) is an emerging type of forming process whose capabilities are not yet fully understood. So while it is clear that ISF processes have several advantages including low cost, good surface finish and low lead times there are also limitations such as accuracy and the lack of predictive physical models of the process.

This work reports experimental studies performed on commercially pure Titanium Grade 4 (CpTi) to understand the process of incremental sheet forming and its impact on the materi als mechanical properties and behavior. This understanding was deve loped by : i) te nsile testi ng and numeric al modeling of specimens from CpTi ii) etching the CpTi sheets to measure major and minor strains, iii) 3D scanni ng to measure spring back and thi ckness vari ation throughout the sheet, iv) Sc anning Electron Microscope to observe microstructure and factography.

Discussion of these resul ts has support the deve lopment of a more detail edunderstanding of the interaction of the process parameters and will lead to new process and experimental design in future work.