CTOD Testing Crack Tip to opening displacement to measure fracture

Toughness
Friction vs Linear vs Rotary Stir Welding.

A review of numerical analysis of friction stir welding.

(He et al., 2014)

In this Modern era, Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is a most innovative solid state joining method which is
extensively accepted by industry for commercial applications. As compared to other joining method,
Friction stir welding has many advantages and benefits than conventional joining method such as low
shrinkage and distortion even in long welds, energy efficient, no grinding, pickling and brushing
required, no filler required, no porosity and spatter. The FSW can be operated with aid of automation and
robot adaption for the special or mass production purpose or upgraded machine tool technology. Any type
of metal can be joined together with maintaining the good characteristics as lightweight, strong and
reliable. It is the most safest and eco-friendly joining method. Recently, NASA (National Aeronautics and
Space Administration) has introduced FSW as a choice for making aerospace components due to
precision and quality of weld.

Method
Rotating pin tool that produces frictional heat with high forging pressure to stir, soften and form a uniform
welding joint between two metal pieces. In the FSW process a non-consumable rotating tool with a
specifically designed pin and shoulder is inserted into the adjoining edges of work pieces to be joined and
traversed along the line of the joint, as shown in Fig. 1. As the tool travels, heat is produced by the contact
friction between the shoulder and the work piece. So, the plastic deformation occurs in the materials in the
stir zone. The high strain and heat energies experienced by the base metal during stirring causes dynamic
recrystallization. As a result, formation of new grains occur in the weld zone.

FTW is an extremely complex process involving numerous highly coupled physical phenomena such as
Plastic deformation, dynamic structural evolution, heat generation due to plastic deformation and friction,
material flow, mechanical stirring, . The Complex geometry of some joints and 3 dimensional
characteristics create it difficult to develop a general system of governing equations for analyzing the
behavior of FTW theoretically.
A coupled
 Fig. 1. Schematic drawing of FSW process

Fig. 2. Joint configurations for FSW: (a) square butt, (b) edge butt, (c) T butt joint, (d) lap joint,
(e) Multiple lap joint, (f) T lap joint and (g) fillet joint

Ref 2
Frictional Stir Welding was tested initially in aluminum alloys by The Welding Institute (TWI).
Fiber Laser Assisted Friction Stir Welding (FLAFSW) process has been applied to the 5754 H11 Aluminum
Alloy for butt welding. Following are the conclusion from this experiment.

The conical tool developed a regular joint with smooth surface and little flash.
The flat shoulder exhibited sensitive to the process parameters when compared to conical shoulder.
The size of the microstructural zones and the hardness profile depended on the Shoulder size.
Defect free weld produced by using large shoulder coated carbide with coating tool.
The grain size in the Thermo-mechanical zone depended on tool shoulder. Flat shoulder has
provided larger grain deformation than the small shoulder.

HE, X., GU, F. & BALL, A. 2014. A review of numerical analysis of friction stir welding. Progress in
Materials Science, 65, 1-66.