A viscoplastic formulation with elasticity for transient metal forming (Q1097746)

A formulation for elastic-viscoplastic flow is presented which retains the basic structure of viscoplastic formulations. The consitutive theory is based on a multiplicative decomposition of the deformation gradient into elastic and inelastic parts. The decomposition is cast in a rate form and the reference configuration for the decomposition is updated at each solution time to coincide with the intermediate configuration. Small elastic strains due to applied stresses are assumed. Volumetric strains due to thermal expansion are allowed to be finite. The inelastic behavior is described by a rate-dependent internal variable constitutive model. In the finite element formulation the elasticity is included in an integral sense over a time step by modifying the flow properties of the material to account for the change in the elastic strain over the step. The geometric update is made by a semi-implicit Euler integration of the velocity field so that the current geometry and state depend on the current solution for the velocity. Application to analytical and experimental benchmarks in metal forming indicate the accuracy and stability of the method.