Easily formable steels

Description

Easily formable steels are used primarily for technically difficult components such as complete side apertures or spare tire tubs. Categories include:

Conventional deep-drawing grades
Conventional deep-drawing grades are unalloyed, soft steels such as, for example, DC04, DC05. These have been optimized for the best possible forming characteristics.

IF steels
IFsteels demonstrate good formability for the most difficult drawin parts with high degrees of stretch and deep-drawing strain in the lower tensile strength range by high r and n values (e.g. door inner, wheelhouse).Designation: IF 180, IF 260

Bake-Hardening (BH)-steels
We distinguish between two basic kinds of hardening effects. One is the so-called ""work-hardening"" by which we mean hardening caused by the forming process. This second is called bake-hardening that is the result of a heat treatment subsequent to the forming process (usually the baked enameling of the paint).
The advantage of bake-hardeing steels lies in the high degree of formability (comparable to conventional grades) in conjunction with the high final tensile strength of the component after the forming process. BH steels are therefore especially used for outer skin panels. The Opel Corsa was one of the first vehicles in which this steel grade was used in high-volume production. Designation: ZStE 180 BH, ZStE 220 BH, ZStE 260 BH, ZStE 300 BH