Increasing the part accuracy in dieless robot-based incremental sheet metal forming

Roboforming is a dieless, incremental, robot-based sheet metal forming process for cost-effective manufacture of prototype parts and small batch sizes. Its principle is based on flexible shaping by means of a freely programmable path-synchronous movement of two industrial robots driving workpiece-independent forming tools.The novelty of this process leads to a huge need for further research. The main task is to increase the geometrical accuracy which is primarily influenced by the compliance of the involved serial robot structures and the springback effects of the workpiece. An offline model-based and an online sensor-based strategy to increase part accuracy are presented.