study on laser-assisted spinning of aged Aluminum alloy sheet

Abstract

To explore the feasibility of directly spinning thin-walled components from aged aluminum alloy sheets under rapid laser heating, the laser-assisted spinning process of aged 7075-T6 aluminum alloy was carried out by means of an ellipsoid component shear spinning test. Compared with cold spinning, the critical thinning of the laser-assisted spun component was more than 30 % higher than that of the cold spun component, and the laser-assisted spun component has good geometric accuracy, which indicates that the formability of the 7075-T6 aluminum alloy can significantly be improved with the laser-assisted spinning process. Moreover, the Vickers hardness tests for the spun components were arranged to evaluate its mechanical properties. The measurement results show that the micro hardness of the laser-assisted spun component is significantly decreased. The reason for the decrease phenomenon is that the GP zone of the 7075-T6 re-dissolves and the fine precipitates grow up to coarse precipitates.