Quality control on crimping of large diameter welding pipe

Crimping is used in production of large diameter submerged-arc welding pipes. Many researches are focused on crimping in certain manufacturing mode of welding pipe. The application scopes of research achievements become limited due to lack of uniformity in theoretical analysis. In order to propose a crimping prediction method in order to control forming quality, the theory model of crimping based on elastic-plastic mechanics is established. The main technical parameters are determined by theoretical analysis, including length of crimping, base radius of punch, terminal angle of punch, base radius of die, terminal angle of die and horizontal distance between punch and die. In addition, a method used to evaluate the forming quality is presented, which investigates the bending angle after springback, forming force, straight edge length and equivalent radius of curvature. In order to investigate the effects of technical parameters on forming quality, a two-dimensional finite element model is established by finite element software ABAQUS. The finite element model is verified in that its shapes error is less than 5% by comparable experiments, which shows that their geometric precision meets demand. The crimping characteristics is obtained, such as the distribution of stress and strain and the changes of forming force, and the relation curves of technical parameters on forming quality are given by simulation analysis. The sensitivity analysis indicates that the effects of length of crimping, technical parameters of punch on forming quality are significant. In particular, the data from simulation analysis are regressed by response surface method (RSM) to establish prediction model. The feasible technical parameters are obtained from the prediction model. This method presented provides a new thought used to design technical parameters of crimping forming and makes a basis for improving crimping forming quality.