Effect of die parameters and material properties in ECAP with parallel channels

In this paper, the influences of die parameters (die channel angle and channel displacement) and material properties (strength coefficient and strain hardening exponent) are investigated in equal channel angular pressing with parallel channels (ECAP-PC) using three dimensional (3D) finite element simulation (FEM). It has been shown that die parameters play an important role in the magnitude and homogeneity of effective strain. In general, die channel angle has more influence on the magnitude rather than homogeneity of effective strain, decreasing the die channel angle results in a higher magnitude of effective strain imposed on the sample and a higher pressing force. But on the other hand, channel displacement has more influence on the homogeneity of effective strain, increasing the die channel's displacement results in a more homogenous effective strain on the sample cross-section. Simulation on various strength coefficient and strain hardening exponents showed that the magnitude of the strain hardening exponent does not have much effect on the pressing force. On the other hand, the level of pressing force increases when the magnitude of the strength coefficient is increased. (C) 2010 Elsevier BM. All rights reserved.