The Effect of Thickness on the Sheet Metal Bending by Laser Peen Forming

摘要

Laser peen forming, is a purely mechanical forming method achieved through the use of laser energy to form complex shapes or modify curvatures. In the present study, experiments and numerical simulation of laser peen forming are performed to investigate the effect of thickness on the bending direction and bending angle of thin sheet metal. The results show that the curvatures of 1060 pure aluminum sheet change form concave to convex when the sheet thickness increases from 0.5mm to 2.25mm. The concave bending angle is decreased continuously by sheet thickness, and then change to be the convex bending. The numerical simulated bending angles agree well with the trend of the measured results. But the simulations with the Johnson-Cook model are more consistent matching experimental results for the thick sheet metal with a convex bending, while the Elastic-Perfectly-Plastic model produces a better agreement for the thinner sheet metal with a concave bending.