Cross-Section Deformation and Bending Moment of a Steel Square Tubular Section

When bending thin-walled profiles, significant distortion of the cross-section occurs, which has a significant impact on the course of the bending moment characteristics and on the value of allowable bending curvatures. This paper presents the results of experimental and numerical modeling of the box profile bending process, which was carried out in order to determine the dependence of the cross-sectional shape and bending moment of bending curvature. Extensive numerical calculations were used to model the process of shaping a square pipe from a circular tube and to model the bending process, especially when taking into account the effects of such a deformation path. The pure bending moment characteristics and the deformation of the cross-section were performed for a 25 × 25 × 2 mm square tube made of S235JR structural steel. The innovative approach for determining the parameters of cold bending square tubes pertained to considering the stress state in the preserved material in individual areas of their cross-section. The results of numerical modeling—after considering the history of deformation (i.e., the process of forming a square pipe from a pipe with a circular cross-section)—gave a satisfactory agreement with the results of experimental tests, both in terms of the degree of pipe wall deflection and the characteristics of the bending moment.