Friction role in deformation behaviors of high-strength TA18 tubes in numerical control bending

In order to reveal the friction role in deformation behaviors of high-strength TA18 tubes in numerical control (NC) bending, a three dimensional (3D) elastic-plastic finite element (FE) model of high-strength TA18 tubes for whole process in NC bending was established based on ABAQUS code, and its reliability was validated by the experimental results in literature. Then, the bending deformation behaviors under different friction coefficients between tube and various dies were studied with respect to multiple defects such as wall thinning, wall thickening and cross section deformation. The results show that the wall thinning ratio and cross section deformation ratio increase with the increase of the friction coefficient between mandrel and tube f m or decrease of the friction coefficient between pressure die and tube f p, while the friction coefficient between bending die and tube f b has no obvious effect on these. The wall thickening ratio decreases with the increase of f b, f m or decrease of f p.