An effective split of flow and die deformation calculations of aluminium extrusion

The purpose of the research project of which this paper is a result is to g ain insight in design and control parameters of aluminium extrusion by FE s imulations. This is done by means of a thermal FE code based on an ALE algo rithm (Dieka). A short overview is given of the material models as well as the FE methods that are used. It is shown that it is a very efficient way t o separate the aluminium flow and die deformation calculations. Furthermore , it has made it plausible that the complex three-dimensional flow through the extrusion die can be studied very well by means of two-dimensional plan e strain calculations. A comparison is made between two- and three-dimensio nal calculation results. Finally some results of die deformation calculatio ns are shown that are based on different deformation mechanisms. (C) 1999 E lsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.