Research of net-shape power spinning technology for poly-V grooved aluminum pulley

In the paper, a net-shape power spinning process for manufacturing poly-V grooved aluminum pulley from tube billet is investigated through finite element (FE) simulation and forming experiment. The process includes two steps of axial upsetting to drum-shape the tube billet and radial spinning to form the grooved exterior shape of the pulley. The upsetting stage is beneficial for the forming of the middle tooth of the pulley. Firstly, the material characteristics of AL1100 are studied. After the establishment of an FE model under the software environment of DEFROM, the deformation characteristics of the upsetting stage are studied, and the effect laws of mandrel feed and friction on the outside drum-shaped surface of billet are evaluated. Based on the FE simulation results of upsetting stage, the primary loads, the flow of materials, and the stress and strain state of the billet in the spinning stage are studied. The influence laws of the feed radio of the rollers, the diameter of the rollers, the mandrel feed ratio, and the axial clearances between rollers and mandrel or back die on the spinning process are discussed by using orthogonal experiments under FE simulation. Two of the primary loads, namely the spinning force and the main torsion, are found to be most sensitive to the feed radio of the rollers. The chucking force, which is another primary load, is found to be most sensitive to the axial clearances. The formability is found to be most easily affected by the mandrel feed ratio. Furthermore, poly-V grooved aluminum pulleys of high performance are produced by forming experiments on power spinning lathe with the optimized process parameters. The net-shape spinning forming process could provide a new plastic forming method of aluminum pulley parts, and the method of orthogonal experiments may be of general significance to determine and optimize the process parameters in spinning forming.