Abstract
As a forming method for curved hull plates more efficient than the flame bending, mechanical bending using multi point press forming and die-less forming is discussed in this paper. the mechanical forming is a flexible manufacturing system for automatically forming of hull parts. It is especially suited to varied curved parts. This paper discusses a multiple point pressing machine composed of a pair of reconfigurable punches in order to achieve the rapid forming of curved hull plates using division forming and presents how forming information is obtained from the given design surface. Although the mechanical forming can be efficient in the metal forming, spring back after pressing is a phenomenon which must be carefully considered when quantifying the process variables. If the spring back is not accurately controlled, the fabricated shell plate cannot meet assembly tolerance. This paper describes the principles to calculate the proper stroke of each punch at the divided areas. the strokes are determined by an iterative process of sequential pressing and spring back compensation from an unfolded flat shape to its given design surface. FEA(finite element analysis) is used to simulate the spring back of the plate and the IDA(iterative displacement adjustment) method adjusts the offset of pressing punches from the deformation results and the design surface. The shape deviations of two surfaces due to spring back are compensated by integrated system using FEA and IDA method. For the practical application, It is aimed to develop an integrated system that can automatically perform the compensation process and calculate strokes of punches of the double sides' reconfigurable multiple-press machine and some experimental results obtained with mechanical bending are presented.
