Development of Measurement Equipment and Experimental and Numerical Simulation Studies for Warm Forming Limits of High-Strength Steel

This paper describes the research and development of a set of measurement equipment for the warm forming limits of high-strength steel based on the Nakazima bulging test method and the digital image correlation method. The equipment could provide an argon shield and a water-cooling atmosphere, as well as two heating options: heating the specimen, dies, and environment to the test temperature simultaneously or heating the specimen to the test temperature at a higher speed than that for the dies and environment. The equipment was applied to measure the forming limit curves for high-strength DP600 steel at room temperature and at the temperature of 300 °C to verify its performance. The DYNAFORM software was then applied for the digital simulation of the bulging test method. A new limit-strain-fitting method was proposed to eliminate the impact of the distorted grid on the digital simulation process. The change trend of the forming limit curve acquired in the test had sound consistency with the test results.