Inability to finish hydroforming simulation

[ru_machines]

Dear Simscale experts and exprerienced users,

It is unbelieveably cool that such a powerful tool as Simscale is available for online use and with possibility of free trials.

With an idea to use Simscale for simulation of double welded sheets hydroforming simulation I decided firts to try it and compare to published experimantal results. I took this article https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Liu_Wei23/publication/303701017_A_New_Forming_Method_for_Complex_Hollow_Component_by_Double_Sheet_Hydroforming/links/574e9a4208aec988526bcf26/A-New-Forming-Method-for-Complex-Hollow-Component-by-Double-Sheet-Hydroforming.pdf

Using another great online tool, ONSHAPE, I made CAD model of moulds and workpieces as per sizes given in the article, imported it to SimScale and started my exciting journey to the world of FEA

Unfortunately, all my simulation runs failed due to errors. Material model integration error, model non-converging error chased me all the way. I palyed with penalty coeff, boundary conditions, types of non-linearity resolution types, time stepping, meshing - nothing helps. Perhaps I miss something fundamental in my approach.

I would appreciate if you find time to look through my project and advise your thoughts on it.

Hydroforming by ru_machines | SimScale

Best wishes,
Artur

[igaviano]

Hi @ru_machines,

Thanks for posting on the forum and welcome to the SimScale community

I’ll take a look at your simulation shortly and come back here later with some advancements.

Best,
Igor

[igaviano]

Hi again @ru_machines,

I’ve just copied your project and, after applying some refinements to the mesh, the simulation ran successfully. These refinements were basically extrusion refinements along the thickness:

which produces a very well structured mesh:

And local element size refinements to the regions where bonded contacts are present:

which produces a much finer mesh on those regions:

You can find the project I was working on here: SimScale Login

Best,
Igor

[ru_machines]

Thank you very much, Igor!