Studies on Parametric Appraisal of Friction Stir Welding

Abstract

Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is a solid state welding process that uses a third body (tool) to join two faces of the work pieces. Heat is generated between the tool and work piece material due to friction of the tool shoulder with the work piece surface. This leads to rise in temperature which makes the material soft near the FSW tool. Then, both the work piece materials mechanically intermix at the place of the joint to produce the welding. FSW has been successfully used to join similar as well as dissimilar materials. It has also been effectively used to join materials that are difficult-to-weld materials by conventional fusion welding methods. Fusion welding when used to join dissimilar metals leads to defects like lack of fusion, distortion, crack formation, incomplete penetration and undercut. FSW, being solid state welding process, can successfully eliminate most of the defects which occur due to melting of material during welding. Some of the important parameters in FSW are tool rotation speed, transverse speed, tool pin dimension, tool tilt angle, offset of the tool from weld line and tool pin profile. From literature survey it was observed that these parameters affect the quality of weld. So, the influence of the parameters is needed to be established on the weld quality. In this context, the present work highlights the significance and effect of tool rotation speed, welding speed, tool pin profile and offset of the tool on weld quality. Different destructive and non-destructive tests have been carried out on the weld to get insight into the weld and its properties. Friction stir spot welding (FSSW) is a type of FSW, which is used to create a spot weld. The effect of tool rotation speed, dwell time and tool pin dimension has been investigated on spot welding of different materials. Three types of welding have been done in FSSW: similar metals, dissimilar metals and metal-polymer. Face centred central composite design of response surface methodology has been implemented to design the experimental layout for different experiments. Tensile strength test, bending strength test, visual inspection, radiography test and Vickers hardness test are the major tests that have been implemented on the weld to analyse the weld quality. Analysis of variance has been used to analyse the data, find the significant and non-significant parameters and estimate their effect.