THREE-DIMENSIONAL FINITE-ELEMENT SIMULATION OF HOT RING ROLLING.

A model was developed to investigate the hot ring rolling process taking into account the radial and axial rolling tools. Each ring revolution is divided into four separates steps where thermal and thermallmechanical simulations are alternated. The material flow in the deformation zone, taking into account the three dimensional inhomogeneous deformation. is analyzed in steady state conditions. whilst the heat transfer outside of the roll-bite region is analyzed by an axis-symmetric non steady state F.E.M. formulation. Due to its acceptable computational cost. the model is applied to predict the temperature. strain and strain rate evolution necessary for the structure forecast of an industrial ring rolling process.