This article describes the direct hot extrusion process and the typical sequence of operations for producing extruded aluminum shapes from soft and medium-grade aluminum alloys, hard alloys, and aluminum-matrix composites. It discusses key process variables, including extrusion speed and exit temperature, and their effect on product quality. The article also provides information on extrusion presses, press dies, and tooling, and addresses quality issues such as surface defects, blistering, and internal cracking. It concludes with a discussion on the drawing of solid section and aluminum tube.

Drawing is a process by which a workpiece is pulled against a die to produce a wire, bar, or tube with smaller cross sectional area compared with the initial stock. This article discusses the variables that affect the drawing process and the parameters that influence friction, lubrication, and wear. These parameters include process, lubricant, workpiece, and tooling. The article provides information on dry and wet lubrication in wire drawing. The dry lubrication refers to use of solid lubricants while wet lubrication refers to the practice of providing a liquid lubricant to the workpiece-die interface. The article describes the most common types and causes of die wear: abrasive wear, adhesive wear, surface fatigue wear, thermal fatigue wear, and catastrophic failure. It concludes with a discussion on the surface treatment and texturing that are used to reduce die wear in drawing operations.

This article is a comprehensive collection of tables containing formulas for metals processing, namely, casting and solidification, flat (sheet) rolling, conical-die extrusion, wire drawing, bending, and deep drawing. Formulas for compression, tension, and torsion testing of isotropic materials are included. The article also lists the formulas for effective stress, strain, and strain rate (isotropic material) in arbitrary and principal coordinates; dimensionless groups in fluid mechanics; and anisotropic sheet materials at various loading conditions.

This article reviews the general characteristics of copper and copper alloys and explains how these characteristics affect the behavior of strip in different types of forming operations. These forming operations include blanking, piercing, bending, drawing and stretch forming, spinning, rubber-pad forming, and contour roll forming. Specialized forming operations such as hydraulic forming, embossing and swaging, and high-velocity metal forming are also reviewed. The article discusses the forming of smaller and larger parts from copper and copper alloy strips, as well as their property requirements and applications.

Sheet-forming processes provide considerable geometric and material flexibility in meeting these requirements, and design of parts for sheet forming must take into account these benefits as well as the limitations of the processes. This article reviews the basic forming operations and their general geometric features. These operations include hole making, flanging, bead and rib forming, and stretching and drawing for shallow or deep recesses. The article illustrates the general approach to design for sheet forming and the considerations that must be made for material savings and manufacturing ease, in addition to part function. It concludes with information on reducing the amount of scrap in sheet-forming operations.

This article briefly reviews the forming of steel tailor-welded blanks (TWB) with a discussion on the effects of welding on forming. It presents the parameters that are monitored to control the stamping operation for tailor-welded blanks. The article discusses weld factors such as the orientation of weld relative to metal movement in dies, the formability of TWB materials, die and press considerations, and specific factors for the drawing, stretching, and bending of steel tailor-welded blanks.

This article illustrates the mechanics of the deep drawing of a cylindrical cup. It discusses the fundamentals of drawing and drawability. Sheet metal is drawn in either hydraulic or mechanical presses. The article summarizes the defects in drawing and factors considered in press selection for drawing. It explains the types of dies used for drawing sheet metal and the effects of process variables and material variables on deep drawing. The process variables that affect the success or failure of a deep-drawing operation include the punch and die radii, punch-to-die clearance, press speed, lubrication, and type of restraint of metal flow used. The article describes the process of redrawing and ironing of metals. Drawing of workpieces with flanges and drawing of hemispheres are also illustrated. The article also provides information on the reducing of drawn shells, methods for expanding portions of drawn workpieces, trimming, and deep drawing using fluid-forming presses.

This article discusses many of the processes and related considerations involved in the forming of superplastic sheet metal parts. It reviews the requirements for superplasticity and describes the characteristics of superplastic metals. The characterization of superplastic behavior includes the characterization of plastic flow, internal cavitation, and fracture behavior. Processing variables needed for the overall characterization of superplastic behavior are summarized. The article discusses the superplastic forming methods, namely, blow forming, vacuum forming, thermoforming, deep drawing, superplastic forming/diffusion bonding, forging, extrusion, and dieless drawing. It provides information on superelastic forming equipment and tooling. The article explains the thinning characteristics and quick plastic forming and its technological elements. It describes the manufacturing practice of the process. The article concludes with a discussion on the superplastic behavior in iron-base alloys.

Sheet metal forming operations are so diverse in type, extent, and rate that no single test provides an accurate indication of the formability of a material in all situations. This article presents an overview of types of forming, formability problems, and principal methods of measuring deformation. It reviews the effect of materials properties and temperature on formability. The article provides a detailed discussion on the two major categories of formability tests such as the intrinsic test, including uniaxial tension testing, plane-strain tension testing, biaxial stretch testing, and simulative tests such as bending tests, stretching tests, the Ohio State University test, the drawing test, and stretch-drawing tests. It extends the correlation between simulative tests and materials properties using forming limit diagrams and circle grid analysis, and discusses the improvements to the forming limit diagram technology.

This article is a comprehensive collection of terms related to metalworking operations that produce shapes from forging, extrusion, drawing, and rolling operations.

Coextrusion is defined as the simultaneous extrusion of two or more metals to form an integral product that can be carried out using conventional extrusion or drawing equipment at a temperature appropriate to the metal system being formed. This article discusses the applications, billet configurations, and metal flow modes of coextrusion. It presents the analytical studies of coextrusion: deformation energy methods, lower-bound (slab) analyses, upper-bound analyses, and finite-element analyses. These studies are used to identify the regime of material properties and process variables for which sound extrusions can be obtained. The article concludes with a discussion on the state-of-the-art of coextrusion that assists in developing process models, which accurately describe both the macroscopic and microscopic aspects of a process.

Cold heading is typically a high-speed process where a blank is progressively moved through a multi-station machine. This article discusses various cold heading process parameters, such as upset length ratio, upset diameter ratio, upset strain, and process sequence design. It describes the various components of a cold-heading machine and the tools used in the cold heading process. These include headers, transfer headers, bolt makers, nut formers, and parts formers. The article explains the operations required for preparing stock for cold heading, including heat treating, drawing to size, machining, descaling, cutting to length, and lubricating. It lists the advantages of the cold heading over machining. Materials selection criteria for dies and punches in cold heading are also described. The article provides examples that demonstrate tolerance capabilities and show dimensional variations obtained in production runs of specific cold-headed products. It concludes with a discussion on the applications of warm heading.

Workability is the ability of the workpiece metal to undergo extrusion or drawing without fracture or defect development. This article describes the limits of workability in extrusion and drawing in terms of fracture and flaw development and presents some comments on fracture mechanisms. It discusses the empirical projections of absolute workability from various mechanical tests. The article concludes with a discussion on extrusion and drawing process design implications.

The drawing process, one of the oldest metal forming operations, allows excellent surface finishes and closely controlled dimensions to be obtained in long products that have constant cross sections. This article discusses the basic mechanics and preparation steps of drawing. It presents an overview of the processes, equipment, dies and die materials, and lubrication associated with drawing of rod, wire, bar, and tube. The article also provides a discussion on the design considerations and manufacturing of commercial superconducting multifilamentary conductors.

This article contains nine tables that present useful formulas for deformation analysis and workability testing. The tables present formulas for effective stress, strain, and strain rate in arbitrary coordinates, principal, compression and tension testing of isotropic material. The article also provides formulas for flat rolling, conical-die extrusion, wire drawing, deep drawing of cups from sheet metal, and bending, and formulas for anisotropic sheet materials.

This article discusses the applications and tensile properties of selected copper tube alloys, as well as the methods for producing copper tubular products, namely extrusion and rotary piercing. It explains the methods available for the finishing of copper tubular products, such as tube welding, cold drawing, and tube reducing. The article lists the standard dimensions and tolerances for several kinds of copper tubes and pipes in the ASTM specifications, along with other requirements for the tubular products.

This article discusses the mechanics, surface preparation and principles of metal forming operations such as drawing, bending (draw bending, compression bending, roll bending, and stretch bending), spinning, and straightening of bars, tubes, wires, rods and structural shapes. The article also discusses the machines and tools, including dies and mandrels, and lubricants used for these metal forming operations.

This article provides an overview of the classification system of coppers for conductors and for wires and cables, as well as wire rod fabrication techniques such as rolling and continuous casting. Wiredrawing and wire stranding operations, including the preparation of rod surface, drawing, production of flat rectangular wire, annealing, and coating, are discussed. The article also provides information on electrical insulation and jacketing techniques, including polymeric insulation, enamel insulation, and paper-and-oil insulation.

This article begins with an overview of steel wire configurations and sizes followed by a discussion on various wiremaking practices. The wiredrawing operation is discussed, including cleaning, die design, use of lubricants and welds, finishes, coating, and thermal treatments. Metallic coatings can be applied to wire by various methods, including hot dip processes, electrolytic process, and metal cladding by rolling metallic strip over the wire. These wires are normally grouped into broad usage categories. These categories, as well as some items in each category, are described in the article under their quality descriptions or commodity names. These include low-carbon steel wire for general usage, wire for structural applications, wire for packaging and container applications, wire for prestressed concrete, wire for electrical or conductor applications, rope wire, mechanical spring wire for general use, wire for fasteners, mechanical spring wire for special applications, upholstery spring construction wire, and alloy wire.