Wall thinning behaviors of high strength 0Cr21Ni6Mn9N tube in numerical control bending considering variation of elastic modulus

Wall thinning, as one of the key defects in tube bending determined the forming quality and limit, is more easily to occur due to the specific properties of high strength 0Cr21Ni6Mn9N stainless steel tube (0Cr21Ni6Mn9N-HS tube). To achieve tube accuracy numerical control (NC) bending forming, the wall thinning characteristics of the 0Cr21Ni6Mn9N-HS tube should be clarified. An analytical model was proposed to reveal the essential relation between tube parameters and wall thickness distribution. Considering the varied elastic modulus, a finite element (FE) model was applied to explore the wall thinning under different geometrical and process parameters. Using the modified multi-parameter sensitivity analysis method combined with FE simulation, the sensitivity of the wall thinning to geometrical and process parameters was carried out. The experiments of NC tube bending were conducted to validate the analytical and simulate results. The results show that the varied elastic modulus can enhance the wall thinning degree, but has no obvious effect on wall thinning characteristics. The wall thinning characteristics under different geometrical and process parameters are revealed and the reasonable parameters ranges for the 0Cr21Ni6Mn9N-HS tube in NC bending are obtained. The most sensitive parameter on wall thinning is the relative bending radius, while the bending angle is the least one.