A numerical simulation of the limiting dome height test, due to Hecker and Ghosh, has been implemented using a commercial FEM code. The model incorporates transverse anisotropic effects through the use of Hill’s quadratic yield criterion. The validation of the model was based on a series of interrupted dome height tests on two AK steels and one experimental aluminum alloy sheet. Three geometries, representative of the three primary forming conditions (stretching, plane strain, and drawing), were tested for each material. Circle grid analysis was used to obtain measured Green’s strain distributions for the tested specimens.

Numerical results indicate reasonable agreement between the predicted and measured results for steel. The implementation of the anisotropic material model is seen to significantly improve the predicted strain distributions. Poor agreement between numerical and measured strain results was observed for the aluminum. The trends observed in the aluminum FEM model were consistent with previous analytical studies of Hill’s yield criteria which indicate that the quadratic yield criteria does not provide an accurate prediction of the flow characteristics of a material with r < 1.

An examination of the effects of anisotropy and frictional coefficient was carried out in the form of a param eter study of r and μ. Predicted trends for variations in r are consistent with other solutions using the quadratic yield criteria. The numerical model, which incorporates the Coulomb formulation for frictional forces, was shown to be very sensitive to variations in μ.