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A model for oil-in-water emulsion has been developed in this paper. A group of viscosity coefficients transiting smoothly and incessantly from the thick film region to the thin film region is defined. The contributions from disperse and continuous phases to the total lubricant pressure and pressure gradient are functions of the oil concentration and the film thickness. The parameters used in these functions are determined by a series of computational fluid dynamics simulations. The onset of inversion and the viscosity after inversion are also investigated. It is found that the critical volume fraction of oil in the inception of inversion is dependent on the oil viscosity and a factor regarding the combined effects from the emulsifier, pH value, droplet size, and the shear rate. A series of simulations using the proposed model has been carried out and compared with the experimental results, such as the film thickness and the extension of oil pool for various rolling speeds and supply oil concentrations. The numerical outputs are basically in agreement with the experiments. [DOI: 10.1115/1.4000274] Keywords: emulsion, phase inversion, effective viscosity, Reynolds equation, hydrodynamic lubrication

The influence of the minute elastic deformation of tool surface, named the 'microwedge,' on the asperity crushing in liquid lubrication is investigated experimentally. The microwedge plays a role so dominant that although increasing the average velocity of the lubricant can alleviate the asperity deformation: such efforts will be overwhelmed by the microwedge effect if the relative sliding velocity between tool and workpiece is also enhanced concurrently. For all roughness patterns, the asperities show multidirectional expansions of the contact region; an important feature of the microwedge effect. The microwedge effect also creates distributions of surface separation and hydrodynamic pressure neither expected nor explainable by the other models.

Based on real-time observation of the workpiece surface in a series of Lo and Tsai's (2002) compression-sliding experiment, it is found that the asperity contact area is much greater than that evaluated by the existing theorems such as the junction-growth theorem. With the aid of finite element analysis, it is verified that the tool sliding motion along with the minute elastic deformation (microwedge) of the tool surface around the asperity peaks increase the asperity contact area significantly even in a frictionless sliding. The microwedge induces a component of force along the sliding direction on the asperity. A combination of flattening and smearing effects can therefore aid in expanding the contact area. The greater the wedge angle, the stronger the propellent effect. An incremental model has also been developed to predict the evolution of contact area during sliding. The numerical simulation compares well with the experimental results. The new mechanism not only introduces an important tribological variable to forming processes but also brings in a new concept of surface quality control for processes having a considerable sliding distance between workpiece and tool such as ironing, forging, and extrusion. New processes performing high relative sliding velocity can therefore be developed to ameliorate the brightness of products. [DOI: 10.1115/1.1574518]

To study the evolution of asperity contact in the sliding contact, a new in situ observation system of sheet metal surface is built up. The workpiece is stationary so that the continuous deformation of a specific group of asperities can be traced. In the case of no strain rate in the substrate of workpiece, the experiments for various materials, roughness patterns, sliding velocities, and normal loads all show that the fractional contact area will increase from its initial state of pure flattening without shear stress, to a saturated value with sliding distance in different rates. The sliding velocity has minor influence on the variation of contact area for same sliding distance. The maximum increasing rate of the contact area is found in the case of medium load. In most cases, the increase in contact area takes place with simultaneously decreasing shear stress and pressure on the flattened asperity peak. The development of adhesive wear can be clearly observed in the case of high normal load and long sliding distance.

A model of a secondary hydrodynamic lubrication mechanism, which is called micro-pool or micro-plasto hydrodynamic lubrication has been developed. It shows that, with sufficiently high viscosity and sliding speed, the lubricant trapped in the micro-pools between the tool and workpiece can be drawn into the interface. The friction force is either increased or decreased, depending on the viscosity and sliding speed. Without bulk stretching, the product of the lubricant viscosity and sliding velocity can be used as an index to indicate whether or not micro-pool lubrication will occur. Stretching the workpiece may make a strong influence not only on the thickness of the permeating film but also on the asperity contact area.

The present 'realistic' friction model is examined by a series of upsetting tests. Specimens made of different aluminum alloys and prepared by various processes display diverse results. Severe surface roughening takes place in some cases using A6061T4 bar manufactured by hot extrusion. It results in a lubrication condition which is very different from the theoretical prediction. From hardness tests and microstructure observations, it is found that there is no obvious correlation between the hardness and the roughening process for A6061T4 alloy. The severe roughening is attributed to the distortion of the coarse grains recrystallized during the preprocess, that is, the hot extrusion. This is rare in sheet metal forming where most workpieces are prepared from cold rolled sheet metals. The orange peel appearance not only changes the lubrication mechanics, but also makes the surface finish of the product unacceptable. Since the existing friction model fails to predict such phenomena, surface roughening and all its related factors must be considered as new, important tribological variables in the friction modeling of bulk metal forming.

A theory employing the concept of potential flow and an easily implemented numerical method are developed. It can offer a preliminary prediction of the optimum blank shape with a little computational effort. The effects of the material anisotropy and the interfacial friction between the workpiece and blank holder on the material flow can be modeled by superimposing a 'sink' or 'source' term in the potential field. Variations in the cup wall thickness are considered. Both convex and non-convex punch profiles are studied. Generally speaking, the contours of the present theory are smoother than the solutions from the slip-line method. The discrepancy of the optimum blank contours between the plane strain and anisotropic cases is more significant for polygon and irregular cup drawing. The influence of friction on the optimum blank contour is not negligible.

A porous medium model is basically a macroscopic description of the fluid behavior and is considered more appropriate to the mixed lubrication regime. The present work has successfully combined the flow factor method, porous medium model and continuum percolation theory to investigate the flow phenomena in the mixed lubrication regime. Not only the lubricant flow can be solved but also the anisotropic percolation threshold can be obtained. Instead of the flow factor which is singular near h = 0, the lubricant flux itself is considered. A new definition of the pressure flow factor which is more appropriate to the mixed lubrication realm is suggested.

The evolution of the surface topography and tool-workpiece contact behavior of an aluminum sheet during plastic deformation has been investigated by a series of indentation tests for various loads, strain rates, and bulk strains. A simple formulation for estimating the roughness of the indented surface and a model of asperity flattening have been proposed. Dynamic balance between the flattening and roughening processes, such as changes of asperity angle and spacing, is considered. Theoretical predictions of the variation of real area of contact with strain show good agreement with experiments. It is found that the very different frictional behavior of aluminum compared with steel sheets is due to the serious change of roughness, including asperity angle and spacing. When the angle is small, the increases in asperity angle and spacing have strong effect on increasing the contact area ratio. However, when the asperity angle is large, increased asperity angle has a significant contribution to the resistance to flattening. The asperity flattening velocity and the increasing rate of contact area ratio arise with the prestrain; however, they are not affected by the strain rate significantly. From FFT analysis, low frequency components (below 10 cycle/mm) due to the rotation of single grains or grain groups are observed on free surface during plastic straining. While in the contact area, in all cases, the low frequency components generated by plastic deformation are compressed.