Study of Hydroforming Lubricants with Overbased Sulfonates and Friction Modifiers

Abstract

Due to the high cost of hydroforming equipment, attempts have been made to model this process using bench testing. While tensile and twist compression tests have yielded promising results, they do not simulate any single metal forming process. In this study we investigated the use of expansion zone, guiding zone, and twist-compression tests to simulate hydroforming processes and evaluated various overbased sulfonates and organic friction modifiers performance. The amorphous overbased magnesium sulfonate improved the performance of the hydroforming oil in the expansion zone and provided no harm in the guiding zone, while the crystalline overbased calcium sulfonate provided no harm in the expansion zone and improved performance in the guiding zone. It was found that the friction modifiers tested display an antagonism, where, as the expansion zone performance increased, the guiding zone performance decreased. Additionally, we found in twist-compression testing that the initial coefficient of friction displayed a small correlation with the guiding zone test (from r = 0.26–0.47), while the failure time displayed a small correlation with the expansion zone test (r = 0.36–0.40).