Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15

Problems of accuracy control in cold forming

Karl Kuzman
Forming Laboratory, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, University of Ljubljana,
AsÏkercÏeva 6, SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia

Abstract

Modern manufacturing technologies demand components produced to very narrow tolerances: the number of non-satisfying parts is
nowadays limited to some tens per million, the ®nal goal being ``zero-defect production''. In order to ful®l these preconditions, the forming
processes must be well understood and kept under permanent control. The geometrical accuracy of cold-formed components depends on
many parameters, among which the most important are the incoming material, the machine, the tools, and the process itself.
This paper ®rst discusses some efforts in analysing the impacts of different process parameters where a combination of experiments and
numerical evaluations was used. The research was oriented towards ranking of the parameters, according to their in¯uence and studying
their interrelated effects on the processes. In the ®nal sections, an interesting phenomenon concerning the accuracy control were presented:
it is possible to ®nd such a combination of parameters where the process is stable, and not so sensitive to the ¯uctuations of parameters. The
de®nition of such ``stable technological windows'' will be very valuable for practice, especially for technology planning. # 2001 Elsevier
Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Cold forging; Cold extrusion; Net shape forming; Accuracy; Process stability

1. Introduction some cutting process parameter ¯uctuations. With forming,

the situation is completely different. Here all process para-
Nowadays several kinds of competitions are witnessed, meters and part geometry are de®ned in advance. The shape
e.g., between regions, between technologies and products, of the part to be forged mostly depends on the tool geometry
etc. For cold forging, it can be said that due to its material and the kinematics of the forming machine. Generally it
savings, very high productivity, and increasingly reduced could be said that the part is a negative of a tool, which may
machining, it has become one of the most promising man- lead one to an incorrect conclusion, that the accuracy of the
ufacturing technologies in the mass production of automo- part depends only on the accuracy of the tool.
tive components. When the technology and its parameters The geometrical accuracy and shape uniformability of the
became better understood, the tools, material, lubricants and cold forged parts and especially their stability, during the
machinery became more reliable, and the processes stabi- production, depends not only on the tool but also on the
lised. Consequently, forming to a complex ®nal shape with whole metal-forming system. To control such a system it is
excellent accuracy enabled the introduction of Net Shape not only enough to identify the in¯uential parameters but
Forming Ð the production of components which can be also essential to know their individual and interrelated
directly assembled [1]. The most convincing evidence of this impacts.
is the fact that modern passenger cars have nowadays 40 and The metal-forming system depends on four major groups
more kilograms of very precise cold forged components [2]. of in¯uential parameters [3]:
There is a fundamental difference between precise
machining and forming. With machining, the geometrical 1. input material Ð with its micro- and macro-geometry,
information about the part to be produced is inside the physical/mechanical properties;
machine, in a processor, where special algorithms control 2. tools Ð with their shape, surface quality, rigidity, sensi-
the cutting tool movements. To achieve a desired shape tivity to thermal dilatations, wear and load resistance;
accuracy, close control loops supported by adequate sensors 3. the forming machine Ð with its kinematics, stiffness
affect the tool movements, to correct or compensate for and sensitivity to heat transfer;
4. the forming process Ð with parameters including the
E-mail address: [email protected] (K. Kuzman). impacts of lubricants, strain, strain rate and temperature

0924-0136/01/$ ± see front matter # 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 9 2 4 - 0 1 3 6 ( 0 1 ) 0 0 6 8 8 - 4
 K. Kuzman / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15 11

distribution inside a workpiece, surface expansion, heat

generation and transfer.

When designing such a complex metal-forming process

where the outgoing product quality is de®ned in advance,
one must also take into consideration the available forming
equipment, the limited costs and the deadline of the produc-
tion start.
Since the metal-forming process is not a single operation
but is composed of several forming steps, and intermediate
heat and surface treatments, it is a very dif®cult task to
design it (with respect to all previously stated in¯uential
parameters and other random conditions) as a stable and
pro®table manufacturing process.
The above discussion of the complexity and interrelation
of the parameters involved when planning a metal-forming
system as well as the fact that the manufacture of forming
tools and their testing can be very expensive and time Fig. 2. In¯uential process parameters and their ¯uctuation in forward rod
consuming, leads to a logical conclusion that a strong extrusion [7].
foundation in knowledge and experience is essential. When
it is possible to control the stated problems then it will be forming stresses and consequently on the variation of the
possible to develop successfully, produce and offer new, outgoing process parameters.
competitive components to the global market, as presented
in Fig. 1.
During recent years, systematic research work as well the 2. Parametric accuracy evaluation
evaluation of industrial data have shown that the input
material is the most relevant parameter which affects the The complexity of the problem discussed can be illu-
geometry of cold forged components [4±7]. Since the phy- strated, e.g., with forward extrusion (Fig. 2), where all
sical properties of the input material vary within a certain incoming and outgoing parameters have some ¯uctuations.
tolerance range due to chemical composition and subsequent Since the diameter of the outgoing part is the most important
heat treatment, there is a ¯uctuation of the ¯ow stresses. As factor, the question arises as to what are the permissible
the geometry of the incoming material also ¯uctuates within ¯uctuations of the incoming parameters that the product
standardised values, this has an in¯uence on the variation of geometry will meet all the demands.

Fig. 1. Trends in the cold forging of gears (courtesy Krupp Presta AG).
12 K. Kuzman / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15

Fig. 4. Calculated deformation of a punch assembly having a steel punch

[8]: (a) under ®xing forces exerted by bolts; (b) under a working pressure
of 2.45 GPa.

Fig. 3. Length (Dl) and diameter (Dd) changes as a result of elastic and the whole assembly, including the part. When the tempera-
thermal dilatations. ture ®eld is quite stable under stationary production condi-
tions, its impact on the process is controllable. However, the
2.1. Elastic response of the system temperature ®eld variation due to unperiodic work, unpre-
dicted stops or other interruptions can substantially affect
The cold forging of metals and especially of steels is the process and the part geometry.
known as a technology of extremely high tool loads, reach- In the cold forging of steels the increase of temperature by
ing sometimes 2000±3000 MPa. Such loads have a remark- several hundred degrees is frequent [10], therefore this effect
able impact on the elastic deformations of the tools, should be treated with great care. From the example pre-
therefore they also in¯uence the geometry of the products. sented in Fig. 3, it can be concluded that the temperature
To demonstrate the range of elastic deformations, a sim- increase of 1008C can change the punch diameter by
pli®ed example is presented in Fig. 3, where it is supposed that 0.02 mm, which is 23 of the tolerance ®eld IT 8. Such cases
the punch is free and loaded only with the axial pressure p. are frequently observed when the cold forging production
Under the load of 2000 MPa the punch with an initial starts with cold tools.
length of 100 mm will become shorter by nearly 1 mm and
thicker by 0.05 mm, which means that the diameter will go 2.3. Problem complexity
out of the tolerance ®eld of IT 9.
As far as the accuracy is concerned, the ¯uctuation of the From the above brief discussion of the parameters affect-
forming pressure by 10% can affect the ¯uctuation of the ing the accuracy of cold forged components, it is obvious
length by 0.2 mm and the diameter by 0.01 mm, which that the problem is very complex. There are another two
means 13 of the tolerance ®eld IT 8. parameters that demand additional analysis. The ®rst is the
In real industrial cases the problems are much more rigidity of the forming machine: the height/thickness of the
complex, as the tools are assembled from different compo- forged part is in a linear correlation with the stiffness of the
nents; they are ®xed or guided; and the stresses are dis- mechanical press, which means that the ¯uctuation of the
tributed inside the tooling system. To estimate the elastic forming force directly affects the heights of the parts and
deformations of systems with many elements, modern indirectly (on a smaller scale) by varying the elastic response
numerical tools, such as FEM are needed. Among the ®rst of other part dimensions.
authors who discussed the importance of proper tool assem- The other parameter is time or heat generation and heat
bly design as well the deformations resulting from ®xing and transfer. When the part is heated due to the forming work,
working were Matsubara and Kudo [8] (Fig. 4). the thermal response of the assembly lies somewhere
between two extreme thermodynamic states. In the adiabatic
2.2. Heat generation and transfer case, there is no heat exchange between the workpiece and
the tool, and the tool temperature remains unchanged; while
It is well known [9] that nearly all of the forming work is in the isothermal process, the temperature of all elements is
transformed into heat, which causes the thermal dilatation of uniform. At the beginning of the forging process, there is an
 K. Kuzman / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15 13

adiabatic case, while later on, when the heat transfer is Taking into consideration, the fact that the tool geometry,
stabilised and stationary, the thermodynamic state is much the elasticity modules of the tools and the part and the
more polytropic. friction coef®cient are constant, the process P can be
The importance of temperature control was clearly dis- described as a function of (see Fig. 2):
cussed by Kato et al. [10], when they used FEM to analyse
1. the ¯ow curve
backward extrusion on a mechanical press from start to
continual operation. sf ˆ Cjne
The complexity of quality assurance can also be seen in
2. the forming work
Fig. 5, where the part geometry depends on elastic system
response as well as on heat generation and transfer. The C0 n‡1
wˆ j
accuracy of the components can be much more uniform after n‡1 e
a correction of the punch diameter for the value K and after
3. the press stiffness
warming up the tools before starting the production.
The discussion of the process complexity can be sum- F
C1 ˆ
marised in the following statement: the part geometry Dh
depends on the forming force F (elastic deformations of 4. heat conductivity, l, thermal dilatation coef®cient, a
the tools and spring-back of the parts and in some cases 5. the incoming material geometry d0, h0, thus:
elastic deformations of the press) and forming work W
(thermal dilatation of the part and the tool as a result of P ˆ f1 …d0 ; h0 ; d1 ; h1 † ‡ f2 …C0 jne ; C1 †
 
the heat generation) ¯uctuation. C0 n‡1
‡ f3 j ; l; a
n‡1 e

As this function has many variables, it is possible to

search for the stable areas where the process is not so
sensitive to the ¯uctuation of one of them, which enables,
e.g., the study of the sensitivity of the deformed material to
¯ow curve changes, changes of the press stiffness, etc.
Analysing the free ¯attening wire process on a real
mechanical press or rod drawing [3], some stable areas of
deformations were found (B in Fig. 6) where the outgoing

Fig. 5. Geometry changes during the cold forging of a special nut (D1, D2,
D3, d1, d2, d3 Ð nut diameters; D0 Ð die diameter; d0 Ð punch diameter) Fig. 6. Schematic interpretation of the outgoing rod diameter ¯uctuation
[6]. Dd1 related to the incoming rod diameter ¯uctuation Dd0 [3].
14 K. Kuzman / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15

part geometry is not affected by the ¯uctuation of the

incoming rod geometry.

3. Direct process stability control

In the previous sections some possibilities of how to

ensure better quality of the cold forged components have
already been discussed. One of the easiest way is to narrow
the incoming material tolerances, however, this will cause
the increase of the price. Another possibility is to build very
rigid tools and presses and to control their temperature, to
ensure stable and uninterrupted production.
Another approach is to use adaptable tools, to implement
controlled die deformation. Osakada et al. [11] presented an
idea to control rod extrusion by using a ring-shaped die
Fig. 8. Cold forging tool with an active die [12].
supported by a conical die holder. As the friction between
the insert die and the holder is kept very low, it is possible to
perform the axial movement of the die and therefore to
correct the outgoing part diameter (Fig. 7).
A similar idea came from Germany where JuÈtte [12]
developed an active die where the inner diameter could
be controlled by additional hydraulic pressure. The experi-
mental evaluation of the developed tool set showed that it is
of great help when cold forging net shaped components such
as gears (Fig. 8).
In the last decade a wide range of neural network applica-
tions has been observed in scienti®c publications, some of
them being focused upon the area of metal forming [13,14].
As metal forming processes are very dif®cult to model and
running processes are very dif®cult to monitor and control,
neural networks can be very useful. Because short cycle
times are typical of forming, the classical approaches of
quality management (SPC, sampling and off-line evaluation,
Fig. 9. Close loop control with estimation of the product property ^y [15].
reaction with delay) are not suf®cient for a zero-defect
strategy. For this reason an European project is started
[15] with the goal to design and manufacture a real-time
closed-loop control enabling stable net-shape cold forging 4. Conclusions
processes (Fig. 9).
Accuracy control of cold forging processes can be divided
into two phases: (1) preparatory phase; (2) exploitation/
production.
The preparatory phase consists of process planning, tool
designing, tool manufacturing and machine selection. It can
be stated that this phase is the most important one: non-
optimal solutions can cause abnormal tool loads and wear,
which can result in moving of the process to an unstable
area.
To shorten the preparatory phase and to avoid high costs
of expensive forming tools and their testing in the real
industrial environment, it is necessary to have a strong
foundation in knowledge and experience. As the numerical
methods using FEM are becoming increasingly reliable,
their careful tuning with the results of successful techno-
logical solutions can further improve their ef®ciency.
Fig. 7. Cold extrusion tool with controlled die deformation [11]. Numerical methods are also very suitable for performing
 K. Kuzman / Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 10±15 15

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