A Quasi-equipotential Field Simulation for Preform Design of P/M Superalloy Disk

On the basis of the minimum energy principle and the minimum resistance law, this article proposes a new method, termed equipotential field method, to design the proper preform for producing isothermo forged P/M superalloy disks. Using this new method, six variant preform contours are acquired with software ANSYS. The isothermal forging process of the P/M superalloy disk is simulated by using the industrial software MSC/Superform with thus obtained preforms so as to achieve the equivalent strain distribution in the final forging and the deformation degree distribution in preforming and final forming. By comparing the equivalent strains, the deformation degrees and other field variables, an optimized preform is acquired.