Investigation on the Formability of Tailor-Welded Blanks

Tailor-welded blanks (TWB) have been widely used in automobile industry. In this paper, expanding experiments are carried out for tailor-welded blanks both with curved seams and straight seams, and the formability of tailor-welded blanks with curved seams has been studied and compared with tailor-welded blanks with straight seams. The effects of thickness ratios and seam radius on the formability of tailor-welded blanks with curved seams and straight seams are deduced, separately. In the end, the relationships between the shapes of welding seams and forming heights, and relationships between the thickness ratios and forming heights are given, which are valued to the designers and processers of tailor-welded blanks.