Coil temperature rise and workpiece forming efficiency of electromagnetic forming based on half-wave current method

Abstract

Electromagnetic forming is a well-developed high-rate forming technology. An important issue of this technology is the temperature rise of the driving coil, which can adversely affect the coil service life. This paper is aimed at addressing this issue through detailed investigation of an electromagnetic forming based on half-wave current method. On the basis of the principle of electromagnetic forming and finite element modelling, this paper compares and analyzes the temperature rise profile of the driving coil along with the forming efficiency of the workpiece in the traditional discharge, the crowbar discharge and the half-wave current discharge models. Results show that with the same system discharge parameters, the half-wave current method can reduce the Joule heating of the driving coil from 1.82kJ to 1.3kJ, which effectively reduces the temperature rise of the driving coil. At the same time, the workpiece forming efficiency is improved from 9.6% to 11.8%. Thus, the half-wave current method can solve the issue of the temperature rise of the driving coil to some extent and promote the process of industrial applications of the electromagnetic forming technology.