AutoForm-OneStep®
Software for
Engineering Manufacturable Sheet Metal Parts
Achieving and exceeding cost, quality and time targets on a vehicle
program are vital to healthy profitability; dictated by today’s
highly competitive marketplace, these targets are more aggressive
than ever before. Designing and engineering parts right the first
time is no longer just desirable, but essential to success. The
“right” design has to satisfy aggressive styling, packaging,
weight and performance requirements while being manufacturable
to adequate and reliable quality, at reasonable cost.
AutoForm-OneStep provides, from very early on in the product development
program, crucial and “real time” assistance to designers
/ design engineers:
 |
In making the right choices on
crucial design elements by identifying formability hot spots, |
|
By validating formability based
on proposed or plausible stamping layouts, and |
|
In assessing the relative cost
of design and material choices. |
AutoForm-OneStep has numerous application opportunities over the
product development cycle, ranging from product formability engineering
through material cost optimization to early assistance in die
and process layout. The diversity of applications and of users,
namely product designers and engineers, process and die face designers,
material and die cost estimators, is made possible by the ease
of usage of AutoForm-OneStep, and by the relative simplicity of
data required to run AutoForm-OneStep simulations.
Enumerated below are the business and engineering benefits that
derive from the typical applications of AutoForm-OneStep; these
benefits highlight both the versatility of AutoForm-OneStep, and
the extendibility of its application through carefully designed
integration between AutoForm modules:
|
Product engineering
- Part formability validation, from early on until product
release
- Design studies to evaluate alternative part designs
- Design studies to evaluate alternative material type/grade
and gage
- Thickness mapping for downstream CAE - crash, durability,
NVH |
|
Material and die cost estimation
- Material / part cost estimation and optimization
- Die cost estimation based on formability assessment and
blank
- Material grade and gage selection for optimal cost / performance |
|
Preliminary die face and process
engineering
- Single- versus multi-stage forming
- Single stamping vs. double-attached
(1-off versus 2-off stamping layouts)
- Optimal die tip |
Besides the above application areas, AutoForm-OneStep complements
the application of AutoForm-DieDesigner and AutoForm-Incremental
through accurate blank development necessary for process planning
and optimization.
The following are a few of the prominent features of AutoForm-OneStep:
|
Ideal for “real time”
design studies by part designers |
|
Unique and proven application
methodology embedded in intuitive set up wizard |
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Simulation based on part or full
tool geometry |
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Automatic / interactive die tip
evaluation |
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Simulation of forming from flat
and wrapped blank |
|
Simulation of parts with tailor-weld
lines |
|
Automatic mapping of forming
results on to application-specific models for crash / safety,
NVH, durability and other CAE analyses |
|
Extensive generic materials library
for initial studies |
|
Development and export of accurate
blank outline |
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Optimal embedding of developed
blank on coil stock |
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Tolerant of gaps / overlaps,
sharp edges, holes in imported part geometry |
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Automatic global filleting of
sharp edges |
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Geometry import from a wide variety
of data formats |
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