Welding Lecture - 9

16 August 2016, Tuesday 11.00 -11.50 am

Welding Processes-
Resistance welding

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 Resistance welding (RW)
• Generate heat through the
resistance to the flow of electric
current in parts being welded
• The parts are usually an integral
part of the electrical circuit
• Contact resistance → heats the
area locally by I2R, → melting →
formation of a nugget
• Contact resistance must be
higher at the point to be welded
than anywhere else.

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Resistance welding

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Resistance welding

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 Resistance welding
• Pairs of water-cooled copper electrodes
• Apply pressure
– To reduce the contact resistance at the electrode-to-workpiece
interface
– Contain the molten metal in the nugget
– To literally forge the work surfaces together in the vicinity of the weld
• The principal process variables
– welding current (several thousands to tens of thousands of amperes)
– welding time (of the order of s)
– electrode force and electrode shape
• DC power (provided from either single-phase or
three-phase AC line 440-480 V using step-down
transformer/rectifiers)
• Usually used to join overlapping sheets or plates as
lap joints, which may have different thicknesses
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 Resistance welding-types

• Resistance spot welding (RSW)

• Resistance seam welding (RSEW)
• Projection welding (PW)
• Flash welding (FW)
• Upset welding (UW)
• Percussion welding (PEW)

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 Resistance spot welding (RSW)
• Series of discrete nuggets
produced by resistance
heating
• Nuggets (welds) are
usually produced directly
under the electrodes, →
Not necessarily if there is
another more favourable
path (shunt), for the
current
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Series resistance spot welding

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 Resistance welding cycle
• Squeeze Time: Time interval between timer initiation
and the first application of current needed to assure
that electrodes contact the work and establish full
force
• Weld time: The time for which welding current is
applied (in single impulse welding) to the work
• Hold Time: The time during which force is maintained
on the work after the last impulse of welding current
ends to allow the weld nugget to solidify and develop
strength.
• Off Time: The time during which the electrodes are off
the work and the work is moved to the next weld
location for repetitive welding. 9
Pressure-current cycle

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 Pressure-current cycle
1. Off time: Parts inserted between open electrodes,
2. Squeeze Time:Electrodes close and force is
applied,
3. Weld time— current is switched on,
4. Hold time: Current is turned off but force is
maintained or increased (a reduced current is
sometimes applied near the end of this step for
stress relief in the weld region), and
5. Off time: Electrodes are opened, and the welded
assembly is removed.
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 Enhanced welding cycle
1. Pre-compression force is used to set electrodes
and work pieces together
2. Preheat is applied to reduce thermal gradients at
the start of weld time or to soften coatings
3. Forging force is used to consolidate weld nugget
4. Quench and temper times are used to produce
desired weld properties in hardenable steels;
5. Post heat is used to refine weld nugget grain size
and improve strength
6. Current decay is used to retard cooling of
aluminum alloys to help prevent cracking
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Enhanced
resistance
welding
cycle

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 Nugget formation

Nugget formation and

heat dissipation into the
surrounding base metal
and electrodes during
resistance spot welding

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 Optimum current, time in RW

• Optimum current and weld time for maximum shear

strength of the RW joint 15
 Resistance seam welding

Conventional
resistance seam Roll spot Continuous
welding, in which welding resistance
overlapping spots seam
are produced
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Resistance seam welding

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Mash seam weld

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 Projection welding (PW),

• Projections or dimples in overlapping joint elements →

concentrate the current during welding, focusing the weld
energy and helping to locate the weld more precisely
• Contact points determined by the design of the parts to
be joined → may consist of projections, embossments, or
localized intersections of the parts
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 Flash welding(FW)

1. Normally used for butt joints → the two surfaces

to be joined are brought into near contact →
2. Electric current is applied →Arcing → Heats the
surfaces to the melting point → the surfaces are
forced together to form the weld 20
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 Upset welding (UW)
• Upset welding (UW) is
similar to flash welding
• Heating in UW is
accomplished entirely by
electrical resistance at
the contacting surfaces;
no arcing occurs.
• Not a fusion-welding
process
• Applications of UW &
FW- joining ends of
wire, pipes, tubes etc.

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 Percussion welding

• Resistance heating by the rapid release of electrical energy

from a storage device (e.g., capacitor).
• Similar to flash welding, except that the duration of the weld
cycle is extremely short, ~ 1 to 10 ms
• Very localized heating → attractive for electronic
applications in which the dimensions are very small
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 Welding Lecture - 10
23 August 2016, Tuesday 11.00 -11.50 am

Heat flow in welds

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 The welding thermal cycle
• Thermal excursion→ Weld temp. ranges from the
ambient temp. of the work environment to above the
liquidus temp. (possibly to boiling point and above for
some very high-energy-density processes)
• The severity of this excursion → in terms of the
– temp. reached
– time taken to reach them
– the time remain at them
completely determines the effects on structure (both
microstructural for material changes and
macrostructural for distortion)
• To quantify the thermal cycle mathematically, we
need temp. distribution in time and space co-
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ordinates
Thermal cycle characterization via
thermocouples

Temp.

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Time
 Thermal cycle- quasi-steady state
• Thermocouples → at various points along weld path
• Approach of the heat source → rapid rise in
temperature to a peak → a very short hold at that
peak → then a rapid drop in temperature once the
source has passed by
• A short time after the heat from the source begins
being deposited, → the peak temperature & rest of
the thermal cycle, reaches a quasi-steady state
• Quasi-steady state → balance achieved between the
rate of energy input and the rate of energy loss or
dissipation
• Quasi-steady state → temperature isotherms
surrounding a moving heat source remain steady and
seem to move with the heat source (away from edges)
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 Thermal cycle- quasi-steady state

HAZ

S Fusion
zone

Temperature isotherms surrounding a moving heat source

remain steady and seem to move with the heat source 27
 Time-Temperature curves
θp Time= Ti (where Ti>To)

Temperature

Time 28
 Time-Temperature curves
• The peak temp. decrease with increasing distance from
the source, and more or less abruptly
• The maximum temperatures reached (TmA TmB, Tmc)
decrease with distance from the weld line and occur at
times (tmA, tmB, tmc) that increase. This allows the peak
temperature, Tp to be plotted as a function of time
• Peak temp. separates the heating portion of the welding
thermal cycle from the cooling portion,
• At a time when points closest to a weld start cooling, the
points farther away are still undergoing heating. This
phenomenon explains
– certain aspects of phase transformations that go on in the
heat-affected zone,
– differential rates of thermal expansion/contraction that
lead to thermally induced stresses and, possibly, distortion
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 Spatial isotherms
Tp (Peak temperature)

Heating zone Cooling zone

Cooling zone

Heating zone

• Peak temperature separates the heating zone & cooling zone

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 The generalized heat flow equation
• Temp. distribution→ Controls microstructure,
residual stresses and distortions, and
chemical reactions (e.g., oxidation)
• The influencing parameters
– the solidification rate of the weld metal,
– the distribution of peak temperature in the HAZ
– the cooling rates in the fusion and HAZ
– the distribution of heat between the fusion zone
and the heat-affected zone
• Requires mathematical formulation to
quantify the influence of these parameters 31
The generalized heat flow equation
Heat supplied + Heat generated /Absorbed
(chemical reaction) = Heat consumed (for
temp rise, melting) + Heat transferred via
conduction + Heat loss via convection &
radiation

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 The generalized heat flow equation
x = coordinate in the direction of welding (mm)
y = coordinate transverse to the welding direction (mm)
z = coordinate normal to weldment surface (mm)
T = temperature of the weldment, (K)
k(T) = thermal conductivity of the material (J/mm s-1K-1) as a
function of temperature
ρ(T) = density of the material (g/mm3) as a function of temp.
C(T) = specific heat of the material (J/g-1 K-1), as a function of
temperature
Vx, Vy, and Vz = components of velocity
Q = rate of any internal heat generation, (W/mm3)

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 The generalized heat flow equation
• This general equation needs to be solved for one, two, or
three dimensions depends on
– Weld geometry,
– Whether the weld penetrates fully or partially
– Parallel sided or tapered, and
– Relative plate thickness
• 1-D solution → thin plate or sheet with a stationary source
or for welding under steady state (at constant speed and in
uniform cross sections remote from edges) in very thin
weldments
• 2-D solution → thin weldments or in thicker weldments
where the weld is full penetration and parallel-sided (as in
EBW) to assess both longitudinal and transverse heat flow
• 3-D solution → thick weldment in which the weld is partial
penetration or non-parallel-sided (as is the case for most
single or multipass welds made with an arc source) 34
 Weld geometry and dimensionality
of heat flow
(a)2-D heat flow for full-
penetration welds in
thin plates or sheets;
(b)2-D heat flow for full-
penetration welds
with parallel sides
(e.g. EBW & LBW)
(c)3-D heat flow for
partial penetration
welds in thick plate
(d)3D, condition for
near-full penetration
welds (non parallel
sides)
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 Rosenthal’s Simplified Approach

• Rosenthal’s first critical assumption →

Energy input from the heat source was uniform and
moved with a constant velocity v along the x-axis of a
fixed rectangular coordinate system
• The net heat input to the weld under theseconditions is
given by
Hnet = ηEI/v (J/m)
where η is the the transfer efficiency of the process E
and I are the welding voltage (in V) and current (in A),
respectively, and v is the velocity of welding or travel
speed (in m/s).
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 Rosenthal’s Simplified Approach
Assumption 2 → Heat source is a point source,
with all of the energy being deposited into the
weld at a single point
– This assumption avoids complexities with density distribution of
the energy from different sources and restricts heat flow analysis
to the heat-affected zone, beyond the fusion zone or weld pool
boundary.
Assumption 3 → The thermal properties (thermal
conductivity, k, and product of the specific heat and
density, Cp) of the material being welded are constants
Assumption 4 → Modify the coordinate system from a
fixed system to a moving system

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 Rosenthal’s Simplified Approach
• The moving coordinate system → replace x with
ξ (Xi), where ξ is the distance of the point heat
source from some fixed position along the x
axis, depending on the velocity of welding, v
ξ=x-vt
where t is the time

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 Rosenthal’s Simplified Approach
• This equation can be further simplified, in
accordance with Rosenthal, if a quasi-stationary
temperature distribution exists.
• Temperature distribution around a point heat
source moving at constant velocity will settle
down to a steady form, such that dT/dt = 0, for
q/v = a constant. The result is

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 Rosenthal’s solution
• Rosenthal solved the simplified form of the heat flow
equation above for both thin and thick plates in which
the heat flow is basically 2-D and 3-D, respectively.
• For thin plates,

q = ηEI/v = heat input from the welding source (in J/m)

k = thermal conductivity (in J/m s-1 K-1)
α = thermal diffusivity = k/pC, (in m/s)
R = (ξ2 + y2 + z2)1/2, the distance from the heat source to a particular
fixed point (in m)
K0 = a Bessel function of the first kind, zero order 40
 Rosenthal’s solution
• For the thick plate,

where d = depth of the weld (which for symmetrical

welds is half of the weld width, since w = 2d)

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 Rosenthal’s solution
• Above equations can each be written in a simpler form,
giving the time-temperature distribution around a weld
when the position from the weld centerline is defined by a
radial distance, r, where r2 = z2 + y2
• For the thin plate, the time-temperature distribution is

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 Dimensionless Weld Depth Vs
Dimensionless Operating
Parameter
• Based on Rosenthal’s solution of the simplified three-
dimensional heat flow equation, Christiansen et al.
(1965) derived theoretical relationships between a weld
bead’s cross-sectional geometry and the welding
process operating conditions using dimensionless
parameters.
• The theoretical relationship between the dimensionless
weld width, D, and dimensionless operating parameter,
n, is shown, where

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 Dimensionless Weld Depth Vs
Operating Parameter n

d = depth of penetration of the weld,

U = welding speed (m/s),
αs = thermal diffusivity (k/ρC) of the base material (as a solid),
Q = rate of heat input to the workpiece (J/s),
Tm = melting point of the base material (the workpiece), and
To = temperature of the workpiece at the start of welding.
For a symmetrical weld bead, the width of the weld bead w = 2d,
→ Cross-sectional area of the weld bead can be determined

Can be applied to the heat-affected zone by simply substituting

TH for Tm where TH is the temperature of some relevant phase
transformation that could take place 44
 Dimensionless weld depth (D) Vs
process operating parameter n
Christiansen (1965)

• Width of the weld bead can

be determined (w = 2d)
• Width of heat-affected zone
can be determined
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 Class Assignment -1
1) Find w and d for symmetrical weld bead as shown in
figure.
2) Find the width of HAZ (phase transition temp = 730 C)

Material steel with Tm= 1510 C

E=20 V
I= 200 A
Welding speed (v or U) =5 mm/s w
T0= 25 C
Arc efficiency η=0.9 d
K=40 W/mK
ρC = 0.0044 J/mm3. C
t=5 mm
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 Effect of welding parameters on heat
distribution

• The shape of the melt , size & heat distribution,

is a function of
1. Material properties (thermal conductivity, heat
capacity, density)
2. Welding speed, and
3. Welding power/energy density
4. Weldment plate thickness

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 Effect of thermal conductivity (and
material property) on heat distribution

• Increasing thermal conductivity

– tends to cause deposited heat to spread
– Smaller welds for a given heat input and
melting temperature
• For a given heat input, the lower the
melting point, the larger the weld

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 Material Thermal
diffusivity
α=k/ρC
(mm2/s)
Aluminium 84
Carbon steel 12
Austenitic 4
steel

Effect of
thermal
conductivity
(and material
property) on
heat distribution
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Effect of welding speed

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 Effect of welding speed on
Shape of Fusion/HAZ
Increasing velocity

Velocit 0 Low Medium High Very high

y
Plan Circle elliptical Elongated Tear Detached
view ellipse drop tear drop
3-D Hemi- Prolate Elongated 3D 3D tear
view spherical spheroidal prolate tear drop
spheroidal drop
Tear drop formation at very high
velocity
Continuous tear drops Detached tear drops at very high velocity

Weld direction
Weld direction
 Effect of welding speed
• For a stationary (spot) weld, the shape, is round
(plan view), and approximately hemispherical in 3-D
• Once the source is moved with constant velocity,
the weld pool and surrounding HAZ become
elongated to an elliptical shape (plan view), and
prolate spheroidal in 3-D
• With increased velocity, these zones become more
and more elliptical
• At some velocity (for each specific material), a tear
drop shape forms, with a tail at the trailing end of
the pool.
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 Effect of welding speed

• Increasing velocity → elongates the teardrop

more and more, → narrows the fusion and heat-
affected zone → overall melted volume constant
• Very high welding speeds → the tail of the
teardrop weld pool detaches → isolate regions
of molten metal → lead to shrinkage-induced
cracks along the centerline of the weld

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 Efect of the thickness of a
weldment

•Thick weldment → Small weld pool and heat-

affected zone 55
 Effect of energy density, Asymmetry
• Increased energy density → increases the
efficiency of melting, → increases the amount
of melting (especially in the depth direction)
→ decreases the heat-affected zone.
• Shape of weld pool & HAZ will be distorted
by any asymmetry around the joint.
• Asymmetry might be the result of the relative
thermal mass (e.g., thickness) of the joint
elements as well as their relative thermal
properties (Tm, k & C)
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 Simplified Equations for
Approximating Welding Conditions
1) Peak Temperatures → Predicting metallurgical
transformations (melting, austenitization, recrystallization of
cold-worked material, etc.) at a point in the solid material
near a weld requires some knowledge of the maximum
temperature reached at that specific location.
→ For a single-pass, full-penetration butt weld in a sheet or a
plate, the distribution of peak temperatures (Tp) in the base
material adjacent to the weld is given by

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 Peak Temperature

To = initial temperature of the weldment (K)

e = base of natural logarithms = 2.718
ρ = density of the base material (g/mm3)
C = specific heat of the base material (J/g K- I)
h = thickness of the base material (mm)
y = 0 at the fusion zone boundary and where Tp = Tm
Tm = melting (or liquidus) temperature of the material
being welded (K)
Hnet = ηEI/v (J/m)
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 Width of the Heat-Affected Zone
• Peak temperature equation can be used to
calculate the width of the HAZ.
• Define Tp → Tre or Tau
• The width of the HAZ is determined by the value of
y that yields a Tp equal to the pertinent
transformation temperature (recrystallization
temperature, austenitizing temperature, etc.).
• Equation cannot be used to estimate the width of
the fusion zone, since it becomes unsolvable when
Tp =Tm
• (Remember the assumption in Rosenthal’s solution
of the generalized equation of heat flow, → Heat
was deposited at a point, and there was no melted
region, but just a HAZ)
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 Assignment 2
A single full penetration weld pass is made on steel using the
following parameters.
Tm= 1510 C, E=20 V, I= 200 A, Welding speed (v or U) =5
mm/s, T0= 25 C, Arc efficiency =0.9, ρC = 0.0044 J/mm3. C,
t=5 mm, Hnet= 720 J/mm
a) Calculate the peak temperatures at distances of 1.5 and 3.0 mm
from the weld fusion boundary
b) Calculate the width of HAZ if the recrystallization temperature is
730° C
c) Find the influence on the width of HAZ if a preheated sample is
used (Assume preheat temp =200° C)
d) Find the influence on the width of HAZ if the net energy is
increased by 10%
e) Find the influence on the width of HAZ if the velocity is increased to
10 mm/s 60