Improving the accuracy of finite element modeling of superplastic hemisphere forming

A novel procedure to determine the values of the material constants K and m for the standard power superplastic law from the results of the bulge tests of the hemispheres is suggested. Unlike other approaches known in the literature.the involved procedure requires only two experimental measurements of the time of formingunder constant pressure, with the thickness at the pole being used to refine the values K and m. Experimental justificationof the developed techniques wasfulfilled on the example of aluminum alloyAA5083. The validity of the suggested approach is confirmed by comparing the experimental data with the corresponding finite element solutions of the boundary value problem in the theory of creep productionusing the ANSYS software. It is found that the maximum deviation of experimental records from the corresponding finite element solutions does not exceed 1% both for the time of formation and for the thickness at the pole.