Micro-Plasma Arc Welding of Thin Austenitic Stainless Steel Sheets:

Process optimization, distortion investigations and weldments

characterization

SHAHROZ Sakhawat1, a, b*, SAGHEER Ahmed1,b , and ABDUR Rehman1,b

1
Pakistan welding institute, Islamabad, Pakistan
a
shahrozsakhawat@hotmail.com, binfo@pwi.org.pk

Keywords: Micro-Plasma Arc Welding, Austenitic Stainless Steel, Heat Affected Zone,
Mechanical Characterization, Microstructural Characterization.
Abstract. In this study a thin austenitic stainless steel sheet of 0.5mm thickness was butt welded by
using Micro-Plasma Arc Welding (MPAW) technique. The process optimization was carried out by
changing welding current and torch speed to achieve sound welds. The weld soundness was checked
on the basis of presence of welding defects included lack of fusion, excess penetration and uneven
weldment by using Visual Test (VT), Penetration Testing (PT) and Radiographic Testing (RT). The
final weldments were produced on optimum values of 2mm/s welding torch speed and at 9A, 12A
and 15A welding current values. The distortion values were measured by using Co-ordinate
Measuring Machine (CMM) in longitudinal and transversal directions along with angular distortion.
The weldment characterization has been done by using optical metallography, X-Ray Diffraction
(XRD) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) equipped with Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy
(EDS) techniques. Hardness measurements and tensile testing was used for mechanical
characterization. The microstructural details indicated the presence of two phases in the weld
microstructure.

Introduction
Austenitic stainless steels are widely used due to their excellent corrosion resistance and good
mechanical properties. They have many applications in constructional, medical, nuclear and other
industries [1,2,3]. AISI 304L is widely used among different grades of stainless steels because of its
easy formability and cost effectiveness. Welding is widely employed process in the fabrication of
the components that are made from stainless steel. It not only joins thick plates together; but thin
sheets can also be joined. The major issue with the welding of very thin sheets is that they heat up
very rapidly during welding and if heat input is not correctly adjusted they can easily burn through
even producing holes [4]. This result in unwanted distortion as well as uneven heat affected zone
and compromised mechanical properties. This has negative effect on strength of the welded
structures causing the degradation of the product performance along with increase of the
manufacturing cost and delays [5].
Plasma Arc Welding (PAW) is a welding method that uses plasma gas to transfer the electric arc
to the work piece. When gas is heated to extremely high temperatures and is ionized; it becomes
electrically conductive and is termed as plasma [6-8]. PAW has three distinct process variants;
Micro-Plasma Arc Welding (MPAW): 0.1- 15 A; medium current plasma welding: 15-100A; and
keyhole plasma welding: > 100 A. MPAW technique operates at low heat input therefore very fine
sheets of thickness as low as 0.1 mm can be welded with greater accuracy. The characteristic feature
of this welding process is its constrained plasma arc. Due to this constriction the heat contained by
per unit volume of the arc plasma increases and the temperature of the arc can be as high as
11,000°C [6]. The plasma arc is straight and concentrated which gives it deep penetrating power [8]
therefore high depth to width ratios are achieved resulting in reduced angular distortion, narrower
heat affected zone and lesser internal discontinuities and defects. The capability of MPAW to
precisely weld thin sheets makes it suitable for the applications like needles, battery seals, micro-
relay cases, wires, mesh sections etc. [8]. However despite many advantages MPAW is a costly
technique with complex equipment. The adjustment and matching of its parameters are difficult and
must be carefully balanced [6] so that just the right amount of heat is available to produce a good
quality weld; otherwise welding defects that are described above can occur. In this regard precise
control over welding current is essential. Welding current effects arc temperature; an increased
welding current not only deteriorates the weld properties but higher current can damage the welding
electrode [6]. On the other hand the lesser current values can produce lack of penetration or
incomplete fusion in the weldment.
Previously Tseng et al. [1] reported the results about effect of process parameters of MPAW on
weld morphology. They studied the effects of static volt, amount of hydrogen in argon shielding
gas, arc length and clamping distance on weld morphology on AISI 304 steel. They focused on
change in weld morphology and did not performed characterization of the weldment. Urena et al.
[9] determined the optimum welding intensity and travel speed for 2205 duplex stainless steel butt
welds by using PAW in keyhole and melt-in mode. They performed microscopic characterization
for their welds and measured the ferrite contents. Sanchez-Tovar et al. presented many studies [2,
10-11] on corrosion behavior of MPA welded 316L stainless steel in H3PO4 and in heavy LiBr
brines. Prasad et al. [12] performed pulsed current MPAW of various austenitic stainless steels
including AISI 304L, AISI 316L, AISI 316Ti and AISI 321 under single set of welding parameters
and measured weld bead geometry, hardness and ultimate tensile strength. They found that under
same welding parameters AISI 304L has achieved sound weld with better properties than other
types of austenitic stainless steels of the study. Batool et al [13] provided a comparative study
between MPAW and Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) of 0.8mm thick SS 304L sheet. They
found that the joint produced by MPAW has higher tensile strength, higher ductility, smaller
dendrite size and narrow HAZ when compared with sheet welded with GTAW. Zhang et al. [14]
successfully used PAW for the coating of Colmonoy75 and Colmonoy88 on 316L steel for
improving its erosion and erosion-corrosion resistance. Kumar et al. [15] performed the dissimilar
welding of austenitic-ferritic stainless steel by using PAW. They were able to achieve defect free
weld only on certain welding parameters and reported process optimization and microstructural and
mechanical properties.
From the literature review it is observed that no systematic study on effect of change in welding
current on weld characteristics has been done on MPAW of SS304L. By considering the fact that
for thin sheet welding precise control of welding current is important; it appears beneficial to gain
understanding about distortions and metallurgical aspects of MPA welded joints made with
different current values.

Experimental
Base material. AISI 304L stainless steel sheet of thickness 0.5mm was used in this study. The
samples were cut from a rolled sheet with the dimensions of 120 mm × 60 mm × 0.5 mm. The
chemical composition of the base metal is given in Table. 1.

Table 1. Wt% Chemical composition (balance Fe) and mechanical properties of the base metal.

Ultimate
Yield Total
Tensile
C Si Mn Cr Ni Mo Cu S P Strength Elongation at
Strength
(MPa) Fracture (%)
(MPa)
0.031 0.31 1.8 18.4 8.9 0.28 0.27 0.01 0.001 722 272 83
Welding procedure and equipment detail. The automatic MPAW process was used. The thermal
Arc 3A plasma welding torch (model PWH/M-3A), designed for direct current plasma arc welding
using transferred arc plasma process was used. The torch contained a standard 2% lanthanated
electrode having a sharp tip. It was placed on a jig with speed controller to achieve constant preset
speed during welding. The complete welding system includes control console, a direct current
power source, a coolant supply and a gas supply [16].

Table 2. Welding parameters.

Current (A) 9 12 15
Voltage (V) 10
Speed (mm/s) 2
Arc length (mm) 2
Plasma gas flow rate (LPM) 0.5
Shielding gas Argon
Shielding gas flow rate (LPM) 10
Purging gas flow rate (LPM) 5
Torch position Vertical
No. of passes 01

9A 12A 15A

y
z
Figure 1. Photographs showing the weldments at different current values

MPAW parameter optimization. Single pass butt welds were prepared for this work. A number of
experiments were performed to obtain optimized welding parameters for welding of 0.5 mm thin
sheets by changing welding current and torch speed. Slight machining was done on the samples to
smoothen the edges for welding. Prior to welding the samples were mechanically cleaned. A fixture
was used to hold the thin sheets in their positions which also provided heat sink for the welding
heat. No filler metal was used for the welding; also no pre-heating or post-heating was done on the
samples. For very low values of current the sheets remained un-welded or lack of fusion took place.
At very high currents produced excessive penetration and uneven welds occurred. Such welding
parameters were rejected on the criteria of lack of fusion, lack of penetration and excessive
penetration. The welding done on less than 9A current did not produce sound weld so the optimized
current values selected for this work were 9A, 12A and 15 A. The process parameters and current
values are given in Table 2.The photographs of the weldments are shown in Fig. 1.
Analysis techniques. The weldments were visually checked for sound appearance by using glass of
10x magnification, followed by PT for the presence of any surface defects. Cleaner, penetrant and
developer manufactured by MAGNAFLUX were used in these tests. PT was performed according
to ASME Sec V. After that RT was performed by Smart 225 KV X-ray machine as per ASME Sec
V for sub-surface flaws. Right after welding, weldment dimensions were measured with the help of
CMM machine to find out the longitudinal, transverse and angular distortions. The specimens for
tensile testing, hardness testing and metallographic studies were cut from the weldments by using
Laser cutting. The tensile tests were performed on computer controlled UTM model WAW-E1000.
The tensile samples were designed according to ASTM standard A-370 and were also prepared by
Laser cutting technique. For microstructural analysis of the weldment and heat affected zone
standard polishing and etching procedures were followed. The microstructure was analyzed by
optical microscope and Scanning Electron Microscope (Jeol JSM-5910LV) equipped with EDX
 using the software INCA. The study on phase analysis was carried out by XRD technique by using
Bruker D8-Discover equipment with CuKα radiation source with λ= 0.15418 nm. The angular 2θ
range was from 10° to 90° at the scan rate of 2° per minute. XRD spectra were matched by using
JCPDS cards.

Results and Discussion

After welding the weldments were subjected to VT, PT and RT. They were found visually sound
and smooth. No spatter was observed. No surface defect was visible through PT. No porosity,
cracking, or burn mark was observed in the radiographic images of the weldment. Fig. 2 represents
the total longitudinal and transversal shrinkage along with deflection of the weldments as a function
of welding current and corresponding heat input. Distortion has been found along all three axes i.e.
X, Y and Z. The corordinate system is shown in Fig. 1. The trend indicates that with increasing
welding current the residual distortion has increased in all three directions [9]. The same trend is
found for heat input. In welding, heat input is the energy that actually reaches the workpiece to form
the weld, and is a combined function of welding speeed, voltage and current. The longitudinal
shrinkage values were very low and less than 1mm for all the three samples. The shrinkage in
transversal direction was more than shrinkage in the longitudinal direction, still the extent of
transversal shrinkage remained less than 1.5 mm and not much. The deflection along Z-axis was
very noticeable and was more than 3.5 mm in all the samples, these results are in agrrement with
literature [13]. The location for maximum deflection was at the centre where y=0 and at the middle
of the weld in all samples. No deflection occurred at the far edges. The distortions in all directions
were increased when the welding current and heat input was increased as the cooling rate was
decreased with the increase in heat input. Therefore the maximum distortion was observed with the
sample welded with maximum current (15A) and vice versa. Fig.3 shows the 3-D representation of
weldment distortion showing that the residual distortion has taken place in all three dimensions. The
negative values of longitudinal and transversal distortions in the graph represent the shrinkage in the
weldment.
Welding Current (A)
8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

15 A
4.2
4.0
D e fle c tio n (m m )

Longitudinal Shrinkage
3.5 Transversal Shrinkage
Deflection, mm

4.0
Deflection
Distance (mm)

12 A

1.5 3.8

1.0
3.6 9A
0.5 .9
-0-0.9
-0 .6
-0.6 1.2 rsal mm)
--1.2e (
.5
nsv ion
Tra istort
-l0
-0.5 )
0.0
d in a(m m 1.5
--1.5
0.040 0.045 0.050 0.055 0.060 0.065 0.070 0.075 0.080 u
it io n -0.
4 D
n g t -0.4 .8
Heat Input (kJ/mm) L o is to r -1-1.8
D

Figure 2. Distortion as a function of welding Figure 3. 3-D representation of welding distortions

current and heat input

The hardness profile across the weldments is shown in Fig.4. It is seen clearly that the
highest hardness was obtained from the weld region in all the weldments. This happened due to
the formation of fine grained structure in the weld zone due to fast cooling. The graph shows that
the highest weld hardness was achieved when the lowest welding current (9A) was employed.
The weld hardness was decreased when higher welding current values were used. This indicates
that the weld hardness was inversely affected by change in the welding current for the range of
values selected for these experiments. The decrease in HAZ hardness was more for higher current
values and was negligible for the lowest current (9A) value. The increased welding currents
provided increased heat input to the welding plate and reduced the cooling rates thus resulting in
lowering the hardness. The hardness in HAZ was slightly less than the base plate. For lowest
welding current (9A) value the decrease in HAZ hardness was very little, and the maximum
decrease in HAZ hardness was observed in the weld that was made with highest current (15A)
value. The reduction in HAZ hardness was caused by the grain coarsening in this zone. The
higher the current value and the heat input the more the coarsening occurred and the hardness was
reduced.

185
Elongation (%) Yield Strength (MPa) Tensile Strength (MPa)
800 90

700 80
180
9A
70
12 A 600
Hardness (HV)

15 A 60

Elongation (%)
Strength (Mpa)
175 500
50
400
40
170
300
30
200
20
165
100 10

0 0
160 Base plate 9 12 15
Base HAZ Weld HAZ Base Welding Current (A)

Figure 4.Hardness values in different regions Figure 5. Variation in mechanical properties with
welding

The results of ultimate tensile strength, yield strength and elongation values for the base
metal and the weldments are presented in Fig. 5. The trend showed that as the welding current was
increased the tensile strength value was decreased. The yield strength of the weldments was not
much affected by welding procedure. For lowest current (9A) value the yield strength was a little
more than the base plate yield strength and was slightly reduced when higher welding currents were
used. On the other hand the elongation at fracture values were increased with increasing current but
still remained less than the base metal for all weldments. The maximum drop in ultimate tensile
strength and yield strength was achieved in high current weldments which was ~ 25% and ~ 10%
respectively. The maximum drop in elongation at fracture was ~ 45% for the lowest current (9A)

 Austenite (FCC)  Austenite (FCC)

 Ferrite (BCC)
Intensity
Intensity

Figure 6.XRD pattern of base plate Figure 7. XRD pattern of MPA welded region
weldment. The decrease in ultimate tensile strength can be attributed to the lesser strain hardening
in the welded samples which also produced reduced elongation. This was due to the fastly cooled
weld zone which was harder with different structure from the base plate.
The XRD pattern of base plate and welded samples are shown in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7
respectively. The base sample showed only austenite (100) peaks whereas ferritic (110) peak is also
visible in XRD of welded sample along with the austenite peak. The presence of ferrite peak
indicates that during welding delta ferrite was formed due to high welding temperatures and then
retained in the weldment during solidification [18] which is good as fully austenitic welds are
susceptible to micro-fissuring during cooling. In order to avoid this problem, a small amount of
delta ferrite is necessary to be present in weld.

Base metal

HAZ

Fusion Zone

Figure 8. Microstructure of base metal Figure 9. Microstructure of different regions after

welding

Figure 10. Weld microstructure Figure 11. SEM image of near fusion line

Table 3: EDX analysis in weld region (wt %)

Spectrum Cr Ni Fe
Label
1 25.36 5.68 68.97
2 22.87 7.39 69.74
3 21.96 7.17 70.87
4 20.44 9.00 70.57

Figure 12. SEM of weld region (Picture on the left),

points are marked for EDX analysis in Table. 3
The microstructure of base plate is shown in Fig. 8. The microstructure appears typical of austenitic
stainless steel with equi-axed grains i.e. they have same dimension in all the directions. The
microstructural analysis, SEM investigations and XRD presented below were performed on
weldment made with 9A welding current as it has shown lesser distortion, and good mechanical
properties. Fig. 9 is the optical micrograph showing the microstructures of weld zone, HAZ and
base metal formed as a result of welding thermal cycle of high temperature heating and rapid
cooling for weldment made with 9A welding current. The weld region is very compact. The grain
coarsening is visible in the HAZ which has spread about 65µm and is followed by fine grain area of
45µm wide and then the base metal. The weld microstructure is dendritic with skeletal ferrite
morphology and is shown in Fig. 10. The dendritic structure has tree or branch like shape which
forms when molten weld metal freezes rapidly. The skeletal ferrite morphology is formed when
during solidification delta ferrite is transformed into austenitic through diffusion process. This
causes a depletion of austenite forming elements (nickel and carbon) in it and it becomes richer in
ferrite forming elements (chromium and molybdenum) which stabilizes it and delta ferrite is
retained after cooling [17,18]. The resulting microstructure has a skeletal type appearance and is
referred as skeletal ferrite. The presence of skeletal ferrite indicates that the weld metal cooling rate
was favorable for the Ferrite → Austenite (FA) mode of solidification. This solidification occurs
through diffusion and the weld metal solidifies with primary delta ferrite [17, 18]. Also when the
ratio of Creq/Nieq is greater than 1.5 and less than 1.8, the FA mode of solidification happens. The
Cr and Ni equivalents of the present work are 19.14 and 10.73 respectively. The Cr and Ni
equivalents for the actual composition were calculated by using the formulas [19] given below:
Cr Eq= %Cr + %Mo + 1.5x%Si + 0.5x%Nb + 2x%Ti (1)
Ni Eq= %Ni + 30x%C + 0.5x%Mn + 30x%N (2)
The Creq/Nieq value was 1.78 there by confirming the FA mode of solidification and the
retention of skeletal delta ferrite. Hot cracking is an issue which usually appears during weld
solidification. The weld metals which solidify in the ferritic phase and later transforms into
austenite do not produce hot cracking [17]. The XRD pattern of welded region (Fig. 7) showed
ferrite (110) peak along with austenite (100) peak; therefore confirming the presence of delta ferrite
after welding. Peak shift has been observed in the highest intensity peak of austenite which confirms
the presence of residual stresses in the weldment [20] which is the cause of distortion produced in
the samples that was discussed earlier in this paper.
Fig.11 shows the SEM image of the fusion boundary showing dendrites. Fig. 12 is the higher
magnification SEM image from the weld. Four points are marked on the picture for EDX spectrum
and the results are presented in Table. 3. Spectrum 1, 2 and 3 are marked on the dendrites. It is
found that in dendrites; higher amount of Cr is present with low percentage of Ni; also the amount
of Cr in the dendrite increases with the length of the dendrite and is highest in the spectrum 1 which
is measured on the longest dendrite in the figure. Since Cr is ferrite stabilizer therefore the high
percentage of chromium along with lower percentage of nickel predicts these dendrites to be ferritic.
Spectrum 4 is measured from inter-dendritic area and has lowest Cr and high Ni contents as
compared with other three spectrums. It indicates that inter-dendritic area is rich in austenite
stabilizing elements and is austenite. These findings are in agreement with XRD results and
literature [17, 18].

Conclusions

Good quality welds are achievable by MPAW on optimized parameters for 0.5mm thick austenitic
stainless steel sheet. Longitudinal shrinkage remained less than 1mm in all samples. The maximum
deflection and angular distortion was 4.3mm and 7.3° respectively for weldment made with highest
welding current. Longitudinal shrinkage, transversal shrinkage, angular distortion and deflection; all
increased with increasing welding current and heat input. High hardness is found in all weld zones
due to the formation of fine grained structure in the weld. Increase in weld hardness was increased
with decreasing weld current as lesser heat input was transferred to the weld. The yield strength was
not much affected with changing welding current. Overall the weldment made with the lowest
current value had lesser distortion and better mechanical properties. The weld microstructure
consisted of skeletal ferrite in austenitic matrix. XRD confirmed the presence of austenite and
ferrite in the structure. The SEM-EDX analysis of weld dendrites indicated that the dendrites were
rich in ferrite stabilizing element.

Acknowledgment
The authors are thankful to Pakistan Welding Institute for funding this project work; for providing
necessary materials, welding facilities, along with analytical and destructive testing facilities. All
welding related work was carried out by qualified welders provided by PWI. We are thankful to
National Centre for Non-destructive Testing for the non-destructive testing of the samples.

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