H. Raman, Superform USA, Riverside, CA; S. Riley, Superform Aluminium, Worcester, United Kingdom
Over the past thirty years Superform has been a pioneer in the SPF arena, having developed a keen understanding of the process and a range of unique forming techniques to meet varying market needs. Superform’s high profile list of customers includes Boeing, Airbus, Aston Martin, Ford and Rolls Royce. One of the more recent additions to Superform’s technical know-how is Finite Element Modeling and Simulation. Finite Element Modeling is a powerful numerical technique which when applied to SPF provides a host of benefits including accurate prediction of strain levels in a part, presence of wrinkles and predicting pressure cycles optimized for time and part thickness. This talk will outline a brief history of Finite Element Modeling applied to SPF and then go into some of the modeling tools and techniques that Superform has applied and continues to do so to successfully make complicated parts. The advantages of employing modeling in the design stages are then presented with real world examples.
Summary: This talk outlines the modeling and simulation techiques applied on a daily basis at Superform to optimize the process, overcome forming challenges and predict problem areas in making complex parts in a demanding and challenging production environment
