Abstract: The most important procedures in complicated 3 – D massive forming simulation re arbitrarily complex curved tool surface description, automatic meshing of forging and contact treatment between the nodes on deformed workpiece and die-cavity. The 3-D complicated tool surface description together with the automatic 3 – D meshing methods and the contact search is researched based on the cubic B-spline. The complex geometry for die-cavity and forging surface is described, the spline technique for 3 – D mesh generation as well as piecewise mesh generation is proposed and the region-section search algorithm is researched for the advantages of B-spline such as visualization, localization, generalization, flexibility and adaptation for graphic model.

Key words: B-spline, Contact treatment, Curved surface description, Finite element, Mesh generation