Work hardening during alternating load directions of 316L SS

Understanding and modelling the plastic behavior of a material are essential for simulation and design of metal forming processes. Cold pilgering of tubes is a process with very complex strain history with alternating loading direction. This makes evaluation of the work hardening challenging. Cold deformation applied in a single direction predominantly exhibit work hardening, while changes of the loading direction may even cause softening in other directions. The influence of alternating loading directions on work hardening has been experimentally investigated for 316L stainless steel (SS). Cubic specimens were cut out from the preform of the tube. The specimens are subjected to uniaxial compressions in alternating directions along two perpendicular axes. From the results, a cyclic elastic-plastic constitutive model based on a Chaboche-type approach is calibrated and implemented in the commercial finite element code MSC.Marc