Assisted setup of forming processes: Compensation of initial stochastic disturbances

Due to production flexibility, progressive tools are having to produce continually smaller batch sizes. A technician installs these tools in high-speed presses and adjusts several punch-bending operations manually via adjustment screws. Unpredictable deviations in material thickness, temperatures, lubrication, or tool wear can all complicate the setup procedure. In this paper, an approach is proposed to compensate unpredictable, stochastic disturbances for these tools. For this, an experimental design is used to investigate the tool’s behavior systematically. Additionally, a multi-objective mathematical optimization calculates optimized parameters in two steps for this process, after which this approach is validated with a progressive tool.