Abstract：According to the principle of single-point incremental forming, experiment and numerical simulation were employed to study the deformation features, thickness distribution and springback during incremental thread grooving on thin-wall tubes, where Al6061 tubes with outer diameter of 38mm and thickness of 1mm were used. The wall thickness variation was discussed by using Glock’s hinge model, and the effects of groove depth, spacing and feed rate on springback were clarified. Results show that incremental tube grooving on tubular parts can meet the demand of flexible manufacturing, and the errors of groove spacing between the experiment and expectation are within 6%. With the groove depth increasing, wall thinning intensifies, but due to the hinge effect the bottom wall thickness may increase. The springback of tube wall increases with a deeper groove and a larger single step size of tool head, the springback decreases about 40.2% when the single step size is 0.25mm compared with 1.5mm. In addition, the materials near the grooves may deform repeatedly and the local structural stiffness will improve under a small groove spacing (Δl), which can inhibit springback, the springback decreases about 38.5% when Δl is 10mm compared with 50mm.
2022, 
