Research Area Design - Associated Project

Modeling and simulation of the forming behaviour of thermoplastic UD tapes
Kärger, Henning (FAST), Hrymak (UWO)


Thermoforming of continuously fiber-reinforced thermoplastics (CoFRTP) exhibit a great potential for large volume production of structural components due to low cycle times, recycleability and material efficiency. Based on this, manufacturing of CoFRTP in thermoforming processes plays an increasingly important role especially for the automotive sector. Thermoforming processes, however, are influenced by several parameters, like material behavior, tool and laminate temperature, forming velocity or layup sequence. Dependent on these parameters, manufacturing defects like wrinkling are possible. By means of Finite Element (FE) forming simulation, such manufacturing defects as well as the resulting fiber orientation after forming are predictable by taking into account material behavior and process conditions by means of constitutive equations and boundary conditions, respectively. In this project, a coupled thermomechanical approach for semi-crystalline CoFRTP is developed, which enables to consider all relevant process parameters for a robust virtual process and product design.

Figure caption: Comparison of an experimental test (left) to FE forming simulation (shear strain) (right) of a box-shaped, generic geometry and a biaxial layup [1].

[1] Dörr, D.; Lipowsky, L.; Schirmaier, F.J.; Kärger, L.; Henning, F.: An Iterative Approach for the Determination of Tailored Blanks for Waste-Free Composite Forming by Means of FE Forming Simulation. International Journal of Automotive Composites: Special Issue: "Automotive Composites" 2017(Vol. 3., Nos. 2/3/4):323–38.