Numerical and Experimental Studies of Splines Produced by Injection Forging Process

Abstract

This article presents numerical and experimental study of spline production with an injection forging process, in terms of load requirement and material flow. A three-dimensional finite element model has been developed to analyze the effect of initial billet diameter, number of spline teeth, and die corner radius on the required forging load, pattern of material flow, and effective strain distribution. For this purpose, the finite element-based DEFORM-3D software has been used. Also, a series of experimental tests has been carried out using solid commercial lead billets with two different billet diameters and three different die cavities (two, three, and six teeth). The results obtained using the numerical solutions were compared with the experimental data for each case study and good agreement was observed. Both the simulation and experimental results highlight the major role of the above-mentioned parameters on the required forming load and material flow pattern. It has been shown that the initial billet diameter and the number of spline teeth have significant effects on the forming load. Although, the die corner radius has little effect on the required forming load, it is an important factor in forming the material flow pattern and strain distribution.