A new micro scale FE model of crystalline materials in micro forming process

¹ School of Mechanical, Materials & Mechatronic Engineering, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW 2500, Australia
² School of Electrical, Mechanical and Mechatronic Systems, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia
³ School of Material Science and Engineering, Taiyuan University of Science and Technology, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030024, China

^a Corresponding author: jiang@uow.edu.au

Abstract

Micro forming of metals has drawn global attention due to the increasing requirement of micro metal products. However, the size effects become significant in micro forming processes and affect the application of finite element (FE) simulation of micro forming processes. Dividing samples into small areas according to their microstructures and assigning individual properties to each small area are a possible access to micro forming simulation considering material size effects. In this study, a new model that includes both grains and their boundaries was developed based on the observed microstructures of samples. The divided subareas in the model have exact shapes and sizes with real crystals on the sample, and each grain and grain boundaries have their own properties. Moreover, two modelling methods using different information from the microstructural images were introduced in detail. The two modelling methods largely increase the availability of various microstructural images. The new model provides accurate results which present the size effects well.