Weight Reduction in an AA2017 Aluminum Alloy Part through the Gas Forming Process of a Blank with a Variable Thickness

Lighter and lighter products are required by aerospace and automotive sectors in order to reduce fuel cost and carbon dioxide emissions and, to allow using green energy propulsion, such as the electric one. In order to lighten parts aluminium alloys, which have a high strength to weight ratio, are the most commonly used metal materials. They are manufactured through plastic deformation processes often by using tailored blanks. This work focuses the attention on semi-finished products obtained by subtracting material through machining; they are a further class of tailored blanks. In this work, the design of a simple (almost hemispherical) aluminium alloy sheet component in AA2017 aluminium alloy is analysed, with the help of finite element analysis. In order to reduce the component weight; a circular blank was used, characterised by a variable initial profile of the thickness instead of the conventional disc with a constant initial thickness. Given that a more uniform final thickness profile is determined, enhanced resistance characteristics of the product component are achieved. Therefore, the workpiece will be characterized by a weight reduction of about 8% compared to the analogous obtained from a blank with a constant initial thickness. © 2021 Manufacturing Technology.