The manufacture of all aluminum wrought products begins with an ingot or a continuous strip solidified from the liquid state. During molten metal processing (MMP), aluminum undergoes a series of operations that are described in this chapter including melting and alloying, recycling, molten metal treatment, control of inclusions, ingot grain refinement, and direct chill (DC) or continuous casting.

This chapter provides an overview of the blanking process and the forces and stresses involved. It discusses the factors that affect part quality and tool life, including punch and die geometry, stagger, clearance, and wear as well as punch velocities, misalignment, and snap-thru forces. It also discusses ultra-high-speed blanking, fine blanking, and shearing, and the use finite-element simulations to predict part edge quality.

This chapter describes how aluminum sheet and foil alloys are processed to produce functional, economical packages that meet the various industry performance criteria. The focus is on the key customer requirements for three main application segments: foil, cans, and impact extrusions. A huge range of products in this industry segment is also illustrated. The need for sustainable production and recyclability is also discussed.

Separation of billets by shearing avoids material loss and is considerably faster than sawing or cutting. This chapter discusses the billet shearing process, the characteristics of sheared surfaces, and the effect of various operating parameters on surface quality. It also includes formulas for calculating shearing force, work, and power and describes various ways to increase production rates.

This chapter discusses the process of cold forging and its effect on various materials. It describes billet preparation and lubrication procedures, cold upsetting techniques, and the use of slab analysis for estimating cold forging loads. It likewise describes extrusion processes, explaining how to estimate friction and flow stress and predict extrusion loads and energy requirements. The chapter also discusses the tooling used in cold forging, the parameters affecting tool life, and the relative advantages of warm forging.

Furnaces for heat treatment of tool steels include ceramic-lined salt bath furnaces, vacuum furnaces, controlled-atmosphere furnaces, and fluidized-bed furnaces. This chapter describes the classification, operating principles, application, advantages, and disadvantages of each type of furnace.

This chapter discusses the advantages, limitations, and applications of various aluminum casting processes, namely green sand casting process, air set or no-bake molding process, vacuum molding process, evaporative foam casting process, and die casting process. The processes covered also include gravity permanent molding, low-pressure permanent molding, counter pressure, squeeze casting, investment casting, rapid prototype casting, cast forge hybrid, and semisolid metal processes.

This chapter explains that the key to forging is understanding and controlling metal flow and influential factors such as tool geometry, the mechanics of interface friction, material characteristics, and thermal conditions in the deformation zone. It also reviews common forging processes, including closed-die forging, extrusion, electrical upsetting, radial forging, hobbing, isothermal forging, open-die forging, orbital forging, and coining.

Aluminum has many outstanding properties, leading it to be used for a wide range of applications. It offers excellent strength-to-weight ratio, good corrosion and oxidation resistance, high electrical and thermal conductivity, exceptional formability, and relatively low cost. This chapter examines the metallurgy, composition, processing, and mechanical properties of aluminum and its alloys, both cast and wrought forms. It also covers heat treating and basic temper designations, including annealed, work hardened, solution heat treated, and solution heated treated and aged. The chapter concludes with information on corrosion and oxidation resistance.

This chapter describes the general characteristics of two commonly classified metalworking processes, namely hot working and cold working. Primary metalworking processes, such as the bulk deformation processes used to conduct the initial breakdown of cast ingots, are always conducted hot. Secondary processes, which are used to produce the final product shape, are conducted either hot or cold. The chapter discusses the primary objectives, principal types, advantages, and disadvantages of both primary and secondary metalworking processes. They are rolling, forging, extrusion, sheet metal forming processes, blanking and piercing, bending, stretch forming, drawing, rubber pad forming, and superplastic forming.

This chapter describes the ways in which aluminum has been applied to recreation, with special attention on how its usage has changed the nature of these pursuits. It discusses the usage of aluminum in a variety of sports and sport vehicles.

This chapter provides an overview of the alloy and temper designations adopted for aluminum cast and wrought products. It explains the naming system and how to identify the main alloying elements and basic strengthening mechanism from any given alloy and temper designation. The chapter provides additional detail on the strengthening and softening mechanisms that allow aluminum alloys to attain a range of engineering properties. The strength of aluminum alloys can be controlled by three methods: solid-solution hardening by alloying, work hardening by plastic deformation, and precipitation hardening with appropriate alloying and heat treatment.

This chapter discusses the types of sensors used in sheet forming operations and the information they provide. It explains how force sensors protect equipment from overloads due to tool wear, friction, and misfeeds, how displacement and proximity sensors help to prevent die crashes, how acoustic emission, ultrasonic, and eddy current sensors detect tool breakage and part defects such as cracks, and how roller ball and optical sensors measure material flow. It also discusses the role of draw-in, wrinkle, oil-monitoring, and vision sensors and explains how material properties can be derived in real time from various sensor outputs.

This chapter describes sheet metal forming operations, including cutting, blanking, piercing, and bending as well as deep drawing, spinning, press-brake and stretch forming, fluid forming, and drop hammer and electromagnetic forming. It also discusses the selection and use of die materials and lubricants along with superplastic forming techniques.

This chapter provides basic engineering information on aluminum alloys with an emphasis on their use in applications where weight is a significant design factor. It discusses the advantages and limitations of various types of aluminum along with their compositions, designations, and achievable strengths. It explains how some alloys are hardened through solution strengthening and cold working, while others are strengthened by precipitation hardening. It also describes production and fabrication processes such as melting, casting, rolling, forging, forming, extruding, heat treating, and joining, and includes a section on the causes and effects of corrosion and how they are typically controlled.

Magnesium, by volume, is two-thirds the weight of aluminum and one-quarter the weight of steel. It also has good damping capacity, giving it an edge over other metals in high-vibration environments. This chapter discusses the basic metallurgy, alloy designations, compositions, and mechanical properties of cast and wrought magnesium alloys. It also describes the processes used to produce magnesium parts, the causes and effects of corrosion, and the use of protective coatings and treatments.

Beryllium has been successfully joined by fusion welding, brazing, solid-state bonding, and soldering. This chapter describes these processes in detail along with their advantages and disadvantages. It also addresses application considerations such as surface preparation, joint design, and testing.

This chapter discusses bulk deformation processes and how they are used to reshape metals and refine solidification structures. It begins by describing the differences between hot and cold working along with their respective advantages. It then discusses various forging methods, including open-die and closed-die forging, hot upset and roll forging, high-energy-rate forging, ring rolling, rotary swaging, radial and orbital forging, isothermal and hot-die forging, precision forging, and cold forging. The chapter also includes information on cold and hot extrusion and drawing operations.