A finite element method on the basis of texture components for fast predictions of anisotropic forming operations

This paper introduces a novel method of including and updating texture-base d elastic-plastic anisotropy during large-strain metal forming operations. The approach is particularly designed for industrial use since it can be as sembled by integrating existing software solutions from crystallography and variational mathematics. The approach is based on feeding spherical crysta llographic texture components directly into a non-linear finite element mod el. The method is used to perform fast simulations of industrial-scale meta l forming operations of textured polycrystalline materials including textur e update. Instead of yield surface concepts or large sets of discrete grain orientations, a small set of discrete and mathematically compact Gaussian texture components was used to map the orientation distribution function di scretely onto the integration points of a viscoplastic crystal plasticity f inite element model. This method drastically enhances the computing speed a nd precision compared to previous crystal plasticity finite element approac hes. The publication gives a brief overview of the different anisotropy con cepts, provides an introduction to the new texture component crystal plasti city finite element method, and presents examples.