A Study of Improving the Formability of the Commercial Pure Titanium Foils

Abstract

In order to obtain the optimum forming process for commercial pure titanium grade 2 foils, a series of tensile tests and micro scale limited dome height (µ-LDH) tests at four temperatures, and meso scale limited dome height tests (meso-LDH) with three punch speeds were conducted on the as-received foils with a thickness of 75 µm. The effects of temperature, geometry, and high-velocity impact were investigated to understand their influences on the formability of the foils. It has been found in the tensile tests that the formability can be improved by elevating temperatures; this has been validated by the µ-LDH tests. Based on forming limit diagrams (FLDs) of the meso-LDH specimens, the high-velocity impact forming process results in not only much better formability but also more uniform thickness distributions than the quasi-static. By analyzing the fractographical scanning electron microscope (SEM) pictures of the meso-LDH specimens, it has been proven that the formability of the foils by using high-velocity impact process is superior to the conventional process. Furthermore, high-velocity impact causes forming limit curve (FLC) to shift in the upper right direction on the right-hand side of FLD. Therefore, it is suggested forming the foils by using high-velocity impact forming process at the elevated temperature for obtaining a better formability and more uniform thickness distribution. It is also recommended to make the radius of the LDH hemisphere punch close to the smallest feature of the designed products for obtaining more accurate FLCs.