The three-year project, launched last year, brings together researchers from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at VSB – Technical University of Ostrava, Fraunhofer IWU, and the companies UVB TECHNIK, Friedrich GmbH and Dr. Matzat & Co. GmbH. The project is supported by the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic under the SIGMA programme.
During the production of sheet metal components, material properties may vary from batch to batch and can differ slightly, for example in thickness, hardness or elasticity. In addition, sheet metal as an input material is supplied in coils from which it is unwound. During the unwinding process, the coil radius changes, which in turn alters the internal stresses in the material. This can cause the material to behave inconsistently during forming, such as bending or stamping, resulting in defective parts.
“The goal of modern manufacturing systems is to achieve zero-defect manufacturing wherever possible. Every component that fails quality inspection means wasted raw material and energy and therefore leads to losses. For example, increased residual internal stresses result in unacceptable geometric deviations in the final product. The aim of the project is to record the current state of a range of input material parameters and respond to it during the straightening process, which precedes the forming process,” said Petr Bilík, project lead at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, VSB - Technical University of Ostrava.
According to him, the outcome will be the minimisation of the necessary interventions in the parameters of the forming process itself, a reduced need to equip presses with sensors, and, above all, a reduction in scrap.
Text: Martina Šaradínová