Altair has announced that Metal Forming Research Corporation (MFRC) has joined the Altair Partner Alliance (APA) with its forging software, Advisor for Metal Forming Process and Design Expert (AFDEX). Originally developed to analyse the forging process, the software capabilities have expanded to apply extrusion, drawing, rolling, ring rolling, and other functionalities of production lines.
AFDEX is based on rigid-elasto/thermo/viscoplastic finite element method and holds an exceptional strength in plate forging, an integrated process of sheet metal forming and cold forging. It also provides an accurate analysis for a wide range of metal forming processes, with intelligent automatic meshing and re-meshing schemes embedded. It includes a user-friendly interface equipped with fool-proof capabilities and fully-automatic simulation techniques which have been adopted for the cases of multi-stage processes.
AFDEX predicts forming loads to assist in selecting appropriate presses. It also develops and optimizes the metal forming processes which allows process design tryouts to be removed, reducing development time and cost. It also enhances product quality in terms of fibre flows and longer life spans and increases productivity by prolonging die life.
