Parametric design of ring billet for profile ring rolling process based on electric field method and feeding strategy design

One of the main challenges for profile ring rolling process is to guarantee the filling of ring cross section, which is closely related to the design of ring billet and feeding strategy. In this paper, a conical ring with flange is taken as example. The electric field method was applied to present the preliminary design of cross section for ring billet in the qualitative manner. Through central composite experimental design and FEM, a response surface using dimensions of ring billet cross section as control variables and filling map were obtained to determine the dimensional range of reasonable billet. The flow behavior and forming defects in the conical ring rolling process were analyzed, based on which the under-filling distribution map was generated. Besides the parametric design of ring billet, the feeding strategy was also taken into consideration. The effect of feeding rate on the cross section filling, the deform uniformity, and the temperature distribution uniformity were analyzed. Based on the parametric design of ring billet and feeding strategy design, the practical conical ring rolling process was carried out in a stable manner without macroscopic or microscopic defects, which indicates the design methodology for the profile ring rolling process is reasonable.