Bauschinger effect and springback behavior of dual phase sheet steels

With the increasing use of advanced high strength steels in the automotive industry, springback control has become a more critical issue. It is now realized that a more accurate simulation of springback has to take the Bauschinger effect into account, especially when sheet experiences complicated plastic deformation. In this study, the Bauschinger effect in dual-phase (DP) steels was investigated through tension-unloading-reloading tests. Fundamental mechanisms of the Bauschinger effect were examined via two special experiments: (i) TEM study of the dislocation distribution at the different plastic pre-strains in Bauschinger tests; and (ii) residual stress measurement after different tensile strains using in-situ neutron diffraction technology. To investigate the influence of the Bauschinger effect on springback, deep-draw bending tests were carried out with the different friction conditions.;The experimental results of the tension-unloading-reloading tests show the Bauschinger effect in DP steel is much stronger than that in interfacial-free (IF) steel. TEM observation revealed very strong interactions between dislocations and martensite in DP steels. In-situ neutron diffraction tests show that the residual strains caused by inhomogeneous deformation of the two phases in DP steel after deformation are much higher than those in IF steels. The above results support the observation of a strong Bauschinger effect in DP steels. A composite model based on the analysis of internal stress shows further clearly that the residual stresses are the predominant mechanism of the Bauschinger effect in DP steels. A newly defined Bauschinger energy parameter (E beta) was found to be able to quantitatively describe this transient softening before reversed loading.;The unloading responses showed the total recovery comes not only from elastic recovery but also from inelastic recovery. An effective unloading modulus was therefore introduced to reflect the inelastic recovery. Based on the three-point bending tests, an FE model was effectively established to simulate the springback under different pin sizes. In order to investigate the Bauschinger effect on springback behavior, the deep-draw bending test was simulated using finite element method and showed improvement of simulation accuracy with the incorporation of the Bauschinger effect.