Evaluation of die life during hot forging process

열간 단조 공정의 금형 수명 평가

Hot forging is widely used in the manufacturing of automotive component. The mechanical, thermal load and thermal softening which is happened by the high temperature die in hot forging. Tool life of hot forging decreases considerably due to the softening of the surface layer of a tool caused by a high thermal load and long contact time between the tool and workpieces. The service life of tools in hot forging process is to a large extent limited by wear, heat crack, plastic deformation. These are one of the main factors affecting die accuracy and tool life. It is desired to predict tool life by developing life prediction method by FE-simulation. Lots of researches have been done into the life prediction of cold forming die, and the results of those researches were trustworthy, but there have been little applications of hot forming die. That is because hot forming process has many factors influencing tool life, and there was not accurate in-process data. In this research, life prediction of hot forming die by wear analysis and plastic deformation has been carried out. To predict tool life, by experiment of tempering of die, tempering curve was obtained and hardness express a function of main tempering curve.