Finite Elements Method (fem) Simulation Based Prediction of Deformation and Temperature at Rolling of Tubes on a Pilgrim Mill

Several authors described experiments aimed particularly at determination of demandingness of piercing processes, namely with respect to piercing mandrels or their stress load, similarly as e.g. at technology of piercing of extremely high blanks Skripalenko et al. 1 or piercing of continuously cast ingots from alloyed steel 2 . Komori 3 dealt with mathematical simulation of piercing according to Mannesmann and of other piercing technologies 4 . Some studies investigated also technology of tube rolling between three overhung rolls Zhang et al. 5 when authors concentrated on prediction of temperature characteristics of rolling of copper blanks. This paper is focused mainly on mapping of influence of the rolling technology on the pilgrim mill itself with respect to service life of tools, especially pilgrim mandrels at rolling of thick-walled blanks, influenced primarily by thermal and stress load. FEM based computer simulation proved to be an efficient tool for these purposes and results of these simulations were confronted with findings obtained from practice. EXPERIMENTAL