A Decision-Based Design Method to Explore the Solution Space for Microstructure After Cooling Stage to Realize the End Mechanical Properties of Hot Rolled Product

Manufacturing a product involves a host of unit operations and the end properties of the manufactured product depends on the processing steps carried out in each of these unit operations. In order to couple the material processing-structure-property-performance spaces, both systems-based materials design and multiscale modeling of unit operations are required followed by integration of these models at different length scales (vertical integration). This facilitates the flow of information from one unit operation to another thereby establishing the integration of manufacturing processes to realize the end product (horizontal integration). In this paper, we present a goal-oriented inverse, decision-based design method using the compromise Decision Support Problem construct to achieve the vertical and horizontal integration of models by identifying the design set points for hot rod rolling process chain. We illustrate the efficacy of the method by exploring the design space for the microstructure after cooling stage that satisfies the requirements identified for the end mechanical properties of a hot rolled product. Specific requirements like managing the banded microstructure to avoid distortion in forged gear blanks are considered for the problem. The method is goal-oriented as the design solutions after exploration of microstructure space are passed in an inverse manner to cooling and rolling stages to identify the design set points in order to realize the end product. The method is generic and has the potential to be used for exploring the design space of manufacturing stages that are connected to achieve the integrated decision-based design of the product and processes.