Finite Element Simulation of the Stretch-Forming of Aircraft Skins

In the aerospace industry stretch forming is often used to produce skin parts. During stretch forming a sheet is clamped at two sides and stretched over a die, such that the sheet gets the shape of the die. However for complex shapes it is necessary to use expensive intermediate heat-treatments in order to avoid Liiders lines and still achieve large deformations. To optimize this process FEM simulations of this process are performed. A leading edge skin part, made of aluminium AA2024, has been chosen for a preliminary study. The material is modelled with the Vegter yield function, to account for the anisotropic behaviour of the aluminium sheet. Each annealing step is considered to reduce the work hardening completely. The strains in the part have been measured and are used for validation of the simulations. The used FEM model and the experimental results will be presented and conclusions and recommendations for future research will be given.