The effects of die geometry in tube channel pressing: Severe plastic deformation

The effects of die geometry on the deformation behavior of aluminum 6061 alloy tube in a novel severe plastic deformation (SPD) process called tube channel pressing (TCP) were studied using the Abaqus 6.10 software. Using the optimized die geometry, 1 to 3 passes of TCP is imposed not only to validate the simulation results, but also to investigate the performance of TCP as a SPD process. The finite element method (FEM) simulation results show that the moderated plastic strain, the lower inhomogeneity in distribution of plastic strain, and the lower risk of fracture during process can be obtained using the proper die geometry. In addition, the imposed strain is a mixture of shear strain and hoop strain accompanying with little bending strain which makes it relatively different from conventional SPD processes. Experiments shows that the experimentally obtained load–displacement curve of TCP is very close to its FEM predicted counterpart which validates the FEM simulation results. Additionally, after imposing of 3 passes of TCP to 6061 alloy, the grain size of the tube is decreased from a few tens of microns to less than 1 µm while the yield strength is increased from 110 MPa to 325 MPa which show the capability of TCP as a SPD process for tubes.