Experimental and numerical study on formability of friction stir welded TWB sheets based on hemispherical dome stretch tests

In order to investigate formability performance and also to obtain guidelines for the stamping process design of friction stir welded TWB (tailor welded blank) sheets, the hemispherical dome stretching test was experimentally performed and the results of the base and friction stir welded samples were compared. Also, in order to better understand the experimental results, numerical analysis was performed. In this work, five automotive sheets, 6111-T4, 5083-H18, 5083-O aluminum alloy, dual-phase steel (DP590) and AZ31 magnesium alloy sheets were considered by (friction stir) welding the same materials. To represent mechanical properties for the numerical analysis, the non-quadratic orthotropic yield function, Yld2000-2d, was utilized for the aluminum alloy and DP590 sheets, while the Cazacu anisotropic/asymmetric yield function was applied for the AZ31 sheet considering different hardening behavior in tension and compression. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.