Welding in a/c industry

Welding Process

Welding is a process of joining two similar

metals by fusion.
The principal types of welding used for joining
a/c parts are
1. Electric Arc Welding

R. I. Sujith
Dept. of Aerospace Engineering
IIT Madras

Standard Electric Arc, Argon Arc, Submerged Arc

2. Electric Resistance Welding

Spot and Seam Welding

3. Electron Beam Welding

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Heat Treatment After Welding

Heat Treatment
Heat treatment is invariably called for in the case of all
types of Arc Welding.

After welding, the welded component may have

to be heat treated if called for in the relevant
manufacturing drawings.

This is because the material properties are adversely affected

during arc welding due to the intense heat over a wide zone
adjoining the weld joint.

For non heat treatable alloys, only stress relieving is

called for.
For heat treatable light alloys, the heat treatment
prescribed is solutionising followed by precipitation
hardening.
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Heat Treatment.

Inspection

For lightly loaded steel components,

normalizing treatment is sufficient.
For highly stressed low alloy steel parts, the
welded component is to be heated to upper
critical temperature, quenched and tempered.
For Maraging steels, low temperature ageing
treatment is sufficient.

Whichever welding method is adopted, all welds

should be inspected for welding defects, which
include cracks, porosity, slag inclusions, lack of
fusion and penetration.
The inspection methods to be adopted are
specified in relevant manufacturing drawings.
The methods include magnetic particle test, dye
penetrant test and Xray test.
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Can I do it?

Standard Arc Welding

Welding of a/c components can only be undertaken by

an approved welder
welder.
The approval of welders is given by the govt. agencies.
The approval is given only after the welder
welders
performance is evaluated by suitable NDT and
destructive mechanical testing carried out on samples
welded by the welder in the presence of govt. agency
agencys
representatives.
The welder
welders approval has to be renewed every six
months.

An electric arc is struck between the workwork-piece and a

flux coated electrode.
The faces of the weld joint, electrode tip and flux
coating all melt.
The flux protects the metal in the weld zone from
oxidation.
The joint is made when the workwork-piece cools down.
The electrode core material must match the workwork-piece
material
After welding, surplus flux/slag is to be cleaned off.
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Applications of Standard Arc

Welding

Argon Arc (TIG & MIG) Welding

Used for welding lightly loaded steel

components whose sections to be welded are 1.5
mm thick or above
For heavily loaded steel components and for
thinner steel sections, TIG or MIG welding is
adopted.

TIG
Tungsten Inert Gas

MIG
Metal Inert Gas

In both TIG and MIG welding, a stream of

Argon (inert) gas passes around the electrode on
to the weld zone.
The argon gas prevents oxidation of the material
in the weld zone.

TIG Welding

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MIG Welding
In MIG welding, the electrode is consumable and also
serves as a filler.
The electrode/filler is a wire, fed from a reel
continuously to the welding torch.
The electrode/filler melts on the arc being struck and
flows into the weld pool.
The electrode/filler material should match the workworkpiece material.
MIG is used to weld sections more than 3 mm in
thickness.

The arc is struck between a nonnon-consumable

Tungsten electrode and the workwork-piece.
Filler material is added from a hand held filler
rod or wire of the same composition as the
workwork-piece.
The welding is used to weld sections less than 3
mm in thickness.

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TIG & MIG

Submerged Arc Welding

Arc is struck between the electrode and the workwork-piece,

TIG and MIG welding are used to weld

Aluminum alloys and steels.
For Ti alloys, TIG welding is carried out in a
chamber filled with Argon gas.

the arc being submerged under a covering of molten flux,

which is electrically conductive.

This is in addition to the Argon gas flowing over the

Tungsten electrode.

The electrode is a wire, fed along with granules of flux

materials into the weld zone.
The electrode also serves as the filler wire.
On reaching the weld zone, the granules of flux melt
and cover the pool of molten metal.
This process is used to weld thick sections of steel upto
6 mm thickness in one pass.

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Electric Resistance Welding

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Electric Resistance Welding

The parts to be welded are held under pressure

between a pair of copper electrodes, through
which a heavy current is passed

Application
Welding thin sheets of similar metallic materials

Approx. 1000 A at 44-12 V

Heat is generated due to electrical resistance at

the interface of the parts to be joined.
Metal at the interface melts and fusion takes
place.
On cooling, the joint is made.

Two types
Spot Welding
Seam Welding

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Spot Welding

Seam Welding

The electrodes are a pair of copper rods,

between which the sheets to be welded are
positioned.
The welding takes place at discrete intervals.
Spot welding is used for components of stressed
skin construction such as panels and floors
where skin sheets are to be joined with stiffening
members.

Electrodes are a pair of copper rolls between

which the sheets to be welded are passed.
The seam welded joints are continuous
Seam welding is used to weld components such
as fuel tank shells, and other applications which
require the joint to be leak proof.

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Spot/Seam Welding

The Weld Cycle

Two aluminum alloy sheets, upto a maximum

thickness of 3 mm each, can be spot/seam
welded together.

Four phases
1.
2.
3.
4.

PrePre-heat
Dwell
PostPost-heat
release

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Electronic Controls
Electronic controls regulate the pressure (gripping the
pieces to be welded together), current and voltage, and
hence the heat at the interface, throughout the four
phases of the weld cycle.

Electron Beam Welding

Prior to spot of seam welding of the a/c components,

a test piece is to be welded and tested to confirm
that the electronic controls have been properly set and that
the welding will be carried out satisfactorily.

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EBW Fundas

Applications of EBW

Welding is achieved by directing a narrow beam of high

velocity electrons on to the joint surfaces.
Melting and fusion of the joint surfaces is confined to a
narrow zone in this process, leading to excellent
mechanical properties of the joint.
Practically no shrinkage or distortion of the workwork-piece.
The process is also fast.
25 mm thick steel plates can be welded in one pass at
500 mm/minute (as compared to 200 mm/minute for
arc welding).

Components of significantly different sectional

thickness can be successfully joined by the EBW
process, unlike in other welding processes.
Thus, a shaft can be welded to a cluster of gears
or a tailplane spigot to a lever.
If EBW were not used for the foregoing
assemblies, they would have been machined
from heavy piece forgings, leading to very high
material and machining costs.

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EBW Applications

Strength

EBW is used for welding primary structural

components, e.g., the wing torsion box in Ti
alloy for Tornado a/c.
This process is also used for welding
compressor drums of aero gas turbine engines.

The weld strength in this process is of the order

90% of the parent material.
In many cases, heat treatment is not called for
after EBW.
However, for critical primary structural
components, heat treatment may be called for in
the relevant manufacturing drawings.

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Afterwards.
The components after EBW are subjected to
NDT (ultrasonic or X Ray) as called for in the
manufacturing drawings.

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