Synopsis on

DESIGN AND FABRICATION EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF

MECHANICAL AND MICROSTRUCTURAL PROPERTIES OF
THERMOSETTING PLASTIC BY USING FSW

Submitted to

Department of mechanical engineering

Raja Balwant Singh Engineering Technical Campus

Bichpuri, Agra

Affiliated to

DR. A.P.J. ABDUL KALAM TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY

LUCKNOW

For the fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Bachelor Of

Technology in Mechanical Engineering

1
 Abstract
Although Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is a recent addition to plastics joining
technology, it has been shown to have many benefits over traditional welding,
particularly in terms of joint quality. In FSW of thermoplastics, traditional tools
usually form a slit on the backside of the welded specimens. Therefore, a serious
problem named "root defect" occurred and leads to a poor tensile strength of the
workpiece. In this paper, a newly designed tool with two shoulders, touches upper
and beneath surface of the workpiece has been used in order to weld acrylonitrile
butadiene styrene (ABS) sheets. The new tool named, "self-reacting tool",
successfully eliminated back slit of the welded parts. Moreover Shape of the pin
(simple and convex), rotational speed and translational speed are used in
experimentations as the variable parameters affecting mechanical properties.
Tensile strength is considered as the mechanical property of welded parts in this
research. Obtained results show that pin shape has the greatest effect on tensile
strength of welded parts.

2
 Contants
S.NO TITLE PAGE NO.

1. Introduction 4

2. Thermosetting plastic 6

3 Experimental procedure 7

4 Result and discussion 10

5 Prospective of fsw for thermoplastics 13

6 Fsw parameters 14

7 Microstructure 16

8 Scope and advantage

9 Refrence

3
1. Introduction
Joining technologies are usually used in manufacturing of complex parts [1].
Friction stir welding (FSW) is one of these joining technologies that enable to
diminish material waste and to avoid radiation and harmful gas emissions usually
associated with the fusion welding techniques [2]. FSW technology uses a rotating
tool with a combination of a pin which penetrates the material and a shoulder that
travels over the surface as the pin tool traverses along a weld joint. The main
process parameters of this process are tool rotational speed, tool translational
speed, and the tool geometry [3]. In this method friction between the tool and parts
provides required heat for welding and plastic deformation in the material [4]. This
process is suitable for joining of sheets, plates, pipes, hollow sections, etc [5]. FSW
aims for structural demanding applications to provide high-performance benefits in
industry [6]. Although FSW method was initially applied for Aluminum alloys
joining [7, 8], it then has been developed for welding of copper [9, 10], metallic
material [11] and different combinations of material [12]. Recently, some
researchers have investigated the application of FSW on thermoplastics but
obtaining good joints is a very hard task [13]. A simple schematic of FSW process
is shown in Figure1. The cylindrical tool with a pin are rotated and plunged into
the workpieces. Frictional heat causes material to melt. After that tool can traverse
along the joint line and produce a weld between two pieces. Seth R. Strand et al.
[14] investigated the mechanical and microstructure properties of welded
polypropylene sheets using hot shoe method. They finally came to the conclusion
that to achieve minimal disruption of polymer microstructure, welds should be
made at low federate, high shoe temperature, long pressure time and large pin
diameter. Armagan Aricietal. [15] used a new welding method for joining
thermoplastic sheets. Along the joint line at the bottom of the welded parts a root
defect is observed in which a small force even by hand can simply separate the
joints. As a result this defect of root was responsible for all tensile and bending
failure. Gerry Bjorkman et al. [16] evaluated a variation of FSW named self

reacting friction stir welding (SRFSW). Self-reacting friction stir welding

incorporates two opposing shoulders on the crown and root sides of the joint. In
this method, the weld forge force is reacted against the crown shoulder portion of

4
the weld pin tool by the root shoulder. This eliminates the need for a stout tooling
structure to react the high weld forge force required for typical FSW process [16].
Also, due to maximize the joints strength between workpiece sections, the pin
should extend the entire thickness of the workpiece [17]. Therefore, the self-
reacting feature reduces tooling requirements and consequently process
implementation costs [16]. The aim of this research is to present a newly designed
tool that can perform both conventional and self-reacting FSW. Process
parameters, which were used in this paper, are tool rotational speed, tool
translational speed and shape of the pin. The gap (distance between upper and
lower shoulder) is approximately equal to thickness of plates. Using this newly
designed tool, the root defect which debilitates both tensile and bending strength is
eliminated

5
2. Thermosetting plastics,
Thermosetting plastics, such as epoxy resin, are used for in the electronic
components of printed wiring boards (PWBs) and IC packages. The inold residues
of these components are generated as industrial waste froin the production
processes. The PWB waste consists of residue froin cured epoxy resin, glassfiber
and copper circuits. The inold residues froin the production of IC packages
(molding resin waste) consists of cured epoxy resin, silica powder and additives.
Up to now, recycling of this waste has been extremely difficult because the cured
epoxy resins are impossible to remelt, and waste which includes inorganic filler,
such as glassfiber, is hard to pulverize. Accordingly. inost such waste is disposed
of in a landfill site. We therefore developed practical recycling technologies to
overcoine this problem

6
3. Experimental procedure
In this investigation, 100 × 80 × 5 mm Compression-molded ABS sheets produced
by "Aida Plastic" in Tabriz, Iran were used in order to create a butt-joint welding.
ABS is chosen as the experimental material for several reasons. First, ABS is a
very common thermoplastic with a variety of properties and applications. Second,
it is readily joined by every common joining process. Third ABS's light weight and
ability to be injection molded and extruded make its manufacturing process almost
easy for engineers. The most important mechanical properties of ABS are impact
resistance and toughness. Even though ABS plastics are used largely for
mechanical purposes, they also have electrical properties that are fairly constant
over a wide range of frequencies. Large-volume applications for ABS resins
include appliance parts (including electrical/electronic) and
automotive/transportation uses. In these markets, ABS competes with specialty
thermoplastics such as polycarbonates, as well as with Commodity polymers such
as polyvinyl chloride and polypropylene resins. ABS is slightly hygroscopic and it
does not need to dry prior to processing, thus eliminating the need for extra
moisture consideration during testing. ABS is an amorphous thermoplastic with an
approximate distortion temperature of about 91˚C. The FSW tool was machined
from 304 steel T300 Series. In order to prevent rotational movement of the
shoulders, they were fixed by means of a simple fixture. To isolate two shoulders
from rotational movement, two ball bearings were used.
Two polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) washers were used between the ball bearing
and each shoulder for simple positioning the bearing in the shoulder and to prevent
penetration of outpouring melted material into the bearing. PTFE is polymerized
from tetrafluoroethulene by free radical methods and is known for its chemical
resistance and very low coefficient of friction. The melting point of PTFE is about
327 ˚C, higher than the glass transition temperature and even melting point of
ABS. The exploded view of newly designed tool for welding ABS sheets is shown
in Figure 2-a. The plates were welded on a vertical milling machine along their
length after fixing them in a proper position using pre-designed clamps as shown in
Figure 2-b and 2-c [19]. Influence of tool geometry on mechanical properties has
been proven in previous investigations. Moreover in a constant height of pin the
active contact length can affect the mechanical properties of welds. Thus in present

7
research the pin geometry was chosen in two different shapes; convex and simple
(Figure 3). Prior to welding, the processing settings listed in Table 1 were adjusted
to their specific levels [19]. These ranges of the levels result in an acceptable weld
and were selected based on both earlier researches results [20] and present
experimental procedure. In the experimental procedure, as the first step some
practical tests are performed in order to find an approximate range of variables in
which both process repeatability and reproducibility could be determined. It was
observed that in rotational speeds larger than 800 rpm, burning and degradation of
ABS sheets is occurred and welds have poor quality and appearance. In addition,
for rotating speeds smaller than 400 rpm, low frictional heat and inadequate
material mixing results in a very low mechanical strength of welds, as it is
observed the welds of this condition could be easily fractured by hands. Results
also showed that in translational speeds larger than 60 mm/min, weld line area is
full of deformations and external voids. This will lead to a poor weld quality. On
the other hand, using small amount of translational speed causes an increase in
welding time and a decrease in the process efficiency. Therefore the amount of this
parameter is avoided to be smaller than 20 mm/min.

Process preparation of experiment

Heat can be generated by pin rotating which causes friction and stirs the pasty
material. This phenomenon leads to an atomic scale connection [15]. Figure 4
shows the schematic view of butt-joint ABS sheets using FSW process in this
paper. After setting the process parameters according to Table 1, the rotating tool
was entered into the workpiece and the material began to melt. Consequently, by
moving the tool along the joint line, two parts were joined. Newly designed tool
provides satisfactory friction between rotating pin and the ABS sheets and results
in a good material mixture and consequently appropriate weld quality. In order to
prevent "cupping" of the sheets the welds are allowed to cool in the fixture at room
temperature for 2-3 minutes [14]. The specimens of tensile test were cut from the
middle portion of the welded plates. The cutting direction is also perpendicular to
the welding direction [19]. These specimens were formed using a CNC milling

8
machine to a standard size according to EN ISO 527 [21]. Figure 5 shows tensile
test specimens of base material and welded plates. Tensile strength tests were
conducted in a Santam STM-50 machine. The cross head speed of the testing
machine was 5 mm/min. The load and displacement were simultaneously recorded
during the test.

9
4. Results and Discussion
Fracture observation
Having reviewed the literature, the application of FSW on thermoplastics has been

investigated by some researchers but a high-quality joint is usually not easy to

achieve [13]. Although welding process of all specimens of present study was
successfully accomplished, different weld qualities are also obtained in the
experimentations. Based on the joint appearance and quality three different fracture
modes were revealed in the specimens. Figure 6 shows the cross sections of the
three fracture modes of the samples. The cross section of a non-welded ABS is also
depicted in Figure 6-a. The tensile strength of non-welded parts is obtained about
34.14 MPa. Figure 6-b shows the cross section view of the first fracture mode. For
this fracture mode the ability to endure longitudinal loads in a tensile test is low
and welded sheets are easily separated from each other. As it can be seen in the
Figure 6-b the rough fractured surfaces of the two sheets are not in a strong contact
with each other. In other words the weld is improperly formed and it is possible
that the two parts may not fuse completely or that the area of the nugget may be
smaller than what is required for an acceptable joint. This mode that is referred to
as weak weld quality has a tensile strength of about 9 to 11 MPa. Second type of
failure is demonstrated in Figure 6-c. In this type of fracture mode, force applied to
the weld causes a breakage shown in Figure 6-c. This class of fracture includes
samples that have a larger area of the nugget in comparison with the first type of
welds. This fracture mode is referred to as medium weld quality with a tensile
strength of about 11 to 14 MPa. The third kind of fracture that appeared during
tensile tests is shown in Figure 6-d. The specimens of this mode have a relatively
stronger and larger area of the nugget than the samples of first and second modes
of fracture. This can be due to the good mixing of welding material that leads to an
almost fully developed nugget. As a result the quality of the welded specimens is
improved and specimens can bear more burdens than the others modes. This
fracture is referred to as high weld quality with a tensile strength of about 14 to 21
MPa. This classification of welds in fact shows the relationship between
processing parameters and their effects on the tensile strength of elded parts.

10
Effect of translational and rotational speed on tensile strength
Table 2 shows results of the tensile test which were devised through a design of
experiment. The tensile strength of non-welded part is 34.14 MPa as shown in the
last row of table [14]. Effect of translational and rotational speed on the tensile
strength of welded specimens for both simple and convex pins is depicted in Figure
7. The Figure depicts that when rotational speed increases, tensile strength
decreases. It is well known that when rotational speed increases, stirring of the pin
increases and as a result frictional heat of the process will increase [19]. In addition
at high rotational speeds, the melted material is pouring out of the weld zone;
consequently, lack of material can cause a low tensile strength of welded
specimens. Figure 7 also shows that for both simple and convex pins when
translational speed is in its lowest level (20 mm/min), tensile strength does not
change significantly for varying amounts of rotational speed. Figure 7 also
demonstrates that when translational speed increases from 20 to 40 mm/min,
tensile strength increases. However by further increasing of translational speed
from 40 to 60 mm/min, tensile strength decreases. That means that there is an
optimum value for translational speed to reach the maximum tensile strength,
although in the literature choosing the feed rate as high as possible seems not to
cause any problems in the weld quality [22]. A clarification for the obtained result
is the fact that in low translational speed due to low friction between pin and
material, the heat generation rate is low. Therefore, welded parts may not fuse
completely; consequently tensile strength decreases. On the other hand too high
translational speeds (60 mm/min), lead to poor mixing of the material and decrease
the tensile strength. In other words, at high translational speeds, melted material
does not have enough time to mix again, therefore the tensile strength again
decreases.

11
3.3. Effect of pin shape on tensile strength
Previous studies show that process parameters have a significant effect on the
mechanical properties of friction stir welded thermoplastic samples [14, 19]. Tool
geometry is one of the most influential parameters that have a serious effect on the
tensile strength. In welding process of present study besides using the newly
designed tool, two shapes of pin, convex and simple, were used. Comparison of
obtained tensile strength of simple and convex pin versus varying amount of
translational and rotational speeds is demonstrated in Figure 8. According to the
Figure 8, in the welding process, larger amount of tensile strength can be obtained
using convex pin compared to simple pin. During the experimentations the convex
pin was shown to improve welding process stability. In other word when a convex
pin is used friction stir welding process tends to be more stable. This can be due to
the fact that in the newly design tool of this research the plunge depth of pin is
constant, therefore greater contact area between the convex pin and sheets results
in a higher frictional heat and consequently better mixing of welding material and
better distribution of temperature and as a result higher tensile strength. Moreover,
the results illustrate that tensile strength versus translational and rotational speeds
has a same trend for both simple and convex pins. The maximum difference
between obtained results of the two shapes can be observed at condition of 400
rpm translational speed and 40 mm/min rotational speed. Although the contact
surface of convex pin is just 7% larger than the simple one, tensile strength of
convex pin is tangibly greater than simple one (relative tensile strength of 60.6%
for convex pin in comparison with 45.6% for simple pin).

12
5. Prospective of friction stir welding for
thermoplastics
FSW emerged as the advance technique for the joining of similar/dissimilar
metals, alloys and polymers to be potentially adopted in various branches of
manufacturing and engineering (Namely; Structures assembly, oil and gas pipeline
repair, automobile parts joining, aviation joining, etc.) . Fused deposition
modeling (FDM), polymer waste management, Screw extrusion are some of the
techniques which need scientific attentions to be integrated with FSW process for

13
6. FSW Parameters
A significant relationship between the quality and strength of welding with the
process parameters of FSW, such process parameters are pin geometry, a
temperature of shoe, the speed of spindle, feed rate, and distance between top of
the anvil and the bottom of the pin. The feed rate affected by speed rotational that
movesaway more molecules to travel to the other side of the join. Figure 3 exhibits
the effect of rotational rate and welding speed on common polymers, most
polymers required welding speed around 20 (mm/min), rotational rate is more
related to material microstructure, that explained the high variance appears in
rotational rate values. There is some balancing between rotational speeds and
welding speed with the polymer physical properties. Thus, a higher rotational
speed combined low welding speed are required for polymers with high melting
temperature and viscosity, for generating heat that sufficient to flow the fused
materials to ensure producing a high strength of welding.

The higher rotational speed of pin led to a higher tensile and flexural strength, for
example the maximum stress could the material welded withstand is reached up
95% in contrast with the unwelded material for polyethylene sheets when increased
the rotational speed. The high - velocity of rotational nail elevates the topical
temperature near of pin position in material because the thermal conductivity of
polyethylene polymer is too low, that allows the heat transferring to narrow zone.
Thus a concentrated in heat energy is generated at this zone and melts it. It
observed that high level of rotational speed combining with minimal temperature
of shoe leads to degrading polymeric material; the best value of transverse speed is
25 mm/min [20]. By adjusted the rotational speed of the pin and the temperature of
the shoe to high levels at welding of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) sheets
showed an improvement in weld quality, the shoe heat is kept a fixed while a
rotating pin through this shoe stirs melted material [21]. Remember that the
rotational pin speed needs not too high, for example used the tool rotational speed
in range (1000 and 1500 (rpm)), transverse speed (50 and 200 (mm/min)), and the
axial force (0.75 to 4 (kN) ) for acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) plate welds
14
gives good quality. The tensile strength of the resultant weld is below the base
material and is at higher efficiencies of above 60 (%) for higher rotational speed
and axial force providing the weld a good quality. But increasing the rotational
speed more than certain speed created cavities and porosity which draw back the
strength weld and smoothing of weld zone [22]. The welding quality related to the
tensile strength of joined workspaces that are strongly accompanied with the
correct choice of polymers, the best results obtained by polypropylene regarding it
is crystalline microstructure and the high mechanical properties comparing with
other polymers. A very high welding quality was obtained sustainably with some
conditions of welding process; polypropylene welded with very high tensile
strength approached to value of base materials [23] with the assistance of some
conditions as heat plates. With optimization of the weld parameters, the
experimental weld strength reach up to 97% and 101% for cylindrical and conical
pinned tools respectively, to a tensile strength of the base Acrylonitrile Butadiene
Styrene sheets [24]. Table 1 presented the tensile strengths of friction stir welding
polymers contrast with base materials [25].

15
 7. Microstructure
The process of heating polymer until melting it followed by cooling that permitted
polymer to solidification consists of four phases [26-27]: I) Initial heating: in this
phase, the friction generated a heat that warmed material to high temperature.
When the temperature of interface reached to the melting temperature or glass
transition temperature dependent to polymer crystallinity, the polymer will melt
II ) Un-steady melting: the molten zone is heating by shear dissipation. Related to
extremely height of the shear stress and the heat creation which fast increasing the
temperature. In this phase, the molten film is very thin and material could flow. At
increment of the molting film thickness, somewhat of the melted material will
squeezed abroad of the shear stress region. III) Steady-state flow: At equilibrium of
heat generation with heat dissipated at the connecting region the steady–state flow
will tack place. In this case, both temperature and thickness of the molten zone are
constant. This phase acquires the weld zone the strength and quality. IV)
Solidification: The stopping of the rotating machine with continues of the clamps
pressure benefits the diffusion through an interface. The temperature will lower
down that permits to solidification of the polymer. Figure 4 illustrates the phases of
the polymer during heating–cooling process [19].

16
Accordingly the fusion-solidification mechanisms, the welded material regions
characterized into four splits regions: base material (BM), heat affected zone
(HAZ), thermo-mechanical affected zone (TMAZ), and weld nugget (WN) At
some circumstances a root defect appears in the zone under of the joint, this area
lies bottom the rotating pin that forbidden it to stir causing a lack of molting the
material especially at a single passing of weld machine. This root defect is the
accountable of the weakness for all tensile and bending failure causing the weld is
weak. Unfortunately, It is seems there a limitation in numbers of studies about the
FSW, as our survey. A coating of shoulder used to improve the remains stress
accumulated in weld region came from the imputation of fused material to the tool
and thus, better joining performance could obtained. Furthermore, a high quality of
welding material surface is result by coated the tool. These results obtained by
optimization the FSW parameters to enhance the microstructural and mechanical
results. From mechanical tests results and microscopic observations, the best
passing speed for polyethylene of 25 mm/min with using heat assistance of friction
stir welding [20]. Sometimes the technology used to modify the structure of
materials, rather than welding, in this case, it is known as (friction stir process
FSP). The re-orientation of material particles is an example to the structural
modification, a composite of SiC/Al [29] composite is displayed a change in
17
orientation of silicon carbide particles after a single pass of stir friction. The SiC
particles acquired the anisotropic shape of aspect ratio in range (1.6 -1.8). From
SEM investigation it is found that the particles oriented in a preferred orientation
for the non-equiaxed SiC particles after extrusion processing, and the alignment is
parallel to the extrusion direction. Figure 6 exhibits the SEM images that showed
the microstructure modification for SiC/Al composite obtained by using FSP
technology.

The SEM investigation at the center of the seam polypropylene displayed that the
polypropylene kept its spherulitic structure with a smaller diameter to half size.
Several large molecular of cylindritic structures appeared in the transition zone, the
spherulitic particles were aligned at the melted polypropylene and then crystallized
in super-molecules. In HAZ, the shears stress activate the polymer to soft and
exhibited a distorted spherulites structure [30]. At these parts the melt was exposed
to strong shearing during welding, so the polymer crystallized in a layered form,
along certain lines, corresponding to the streamlines. The interface area for 2000
rpm showed an absence of semicrystalline structure, the flow pushes the spherulitic
structure towards base material

18
 Advantage and scope
 Able to be moulded with different tolerances.
 Allows for flexible product designs.
 Improved structural integrity through variable wall thicknesses.
 Typically cheaper than components fabricated from metals.
 Superb electrical insulation properties.

Scope
 Its is easy to use
 Eco friendly
 Efficiency effective
 Fsw joins material in ways unexpected
 Fsw is used in industries for joining plastic material

19
LIST OF FIGURES CAPTIONS:

Fig 1: A representation view of FSW process

Fig 2: a) Exploded view of newly designed tool used in experimentations b)

Workpieces clamped on the fixture. c) Fixture and tool during the welding process

Fig 3: Different geometry of pin a) Simple form, b) Convex form

Fig 4: Schematic illustration of FSW process using the newly designed tool. (a)
Toll starts rotation. (b) Tool moves into the material. (c) Tool is attached to the
material and starts welding. (d) End of the welding and tool is out of the workpiece

Fig 5: Tensile test specimen of a) base material. b) welded plates

20
Fig 6: a) non-welded specimen b) weld with weak quality c) weld with medium
quality d) weld with high quality

Fig 7: Effect of translational and rotational speed on the tensile strength

Fig 8: Tensile strength comparison of welded samples using simple and convex
pins

21
Fig 1: A representation view of FSW process

22
Fig 2: a) Exploded view of newly designed tool used in experimentations b)
Workpieces clamped on the fixture. c) Fixture and tool during the welding process

23
Fig 3: Different geometry of pin a) Simple form, b) Convex form

24
 Fig. 4. Schematic illustration of FSW process using the newly designed tool. (a)
Toll starts rotation. (b) Tool moves into the material. (c) Tool is attached to the
material and starts welding. (d) End of the welding and tool is out of the workpiece

25
 a) b)

Fig. 5. Tensile test specimen of a) base material. b) welded plate

26
 REFRENCE
1.https://doi.org/10.1109/ISEE.1995.514964

2. https://science/article/abs/pii/S1359836817335825

3.https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212827115007210

4.https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40430-020-02750-3
5.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332599031_Friction_Stir_Welding_of_
Thermoplastic_Composites

6. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7288317/

27