International Journal of Mechanical and Production

Engineering Research and Development (IJMPERD)

ISSN(P): 2249-6890; ISSN(E): 2249-8001
Vol. 9, Issue 1, Feb 2019, 523-530
© TJPRC Pvt. Ltd.

AN OPTIMIZATION OF MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF FRICTION

STIR WELDED DISSIMILAR MATERIALS WITH

DIFFERENT PREHEATING CONDITIONS

PRASHANT S. HUMNABAD1 & M. S. GANESHA PRASAD2

1
Research Scholar, Faculty of Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sir M. Visvesvaraya
Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
2
Dean, Professor and Head, Department of Mechanical Engineering, New Horizon College of Engineering,
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
ABSTRACT

The aim of this work is to optimization of the mechanical properties of friction stir welded dissimilar materials
with different preheating temperature. A series of joints were made on 04 mm thick Aluminum7xxx and Mild-Steel
plates. The temperature used to be 100ºC, 150 ºC and 200 ºC. The welding operation performed with different rotational
speeds and traverse speed (1000, 1400 and 2000 ramp and 16, 20 and 25 mm/min) the mechanical properties were

Original Article
measured with respect to tensile strength, impact strength and hardness. The physical properties were examined based
on the microstructure using optical microscope. The results show that weld with 150 ºC, 16 mm/min and 1400 rpm
parameter exhibit the better joint strength of 130.36 MPa.

KEYWORDS: Preheating Temperature, Friciton Stir Welding, Mechanical Properites & Microstructure

Received: Nov 18, 2018; Accepted: Dec 08, 2018; Published: Jan 28, 2019; Paper Id.: IJMPERDFEB201950

INTRODUCTION
Background Information

To produce components with dissimilar materials like ferrous and non-ferrous materials (such as - steel
and aluminium) by fusion welding method is quite difficult, it’s because formation of hard (or) brittle intermetallic
compounds at weld interface. Hence, a new technology is highly desirable to join these materials requires

To produce a good quality weld of steel/aluminium joint, the Solid-State Welding method is more suitable
than other welding processes, since it requires less diffusion bonding time compared to other welding methods.
Also, lower welding temperature and almost no formation toxic gases. This technique can be used to weld
dissimilar materials such as ferrous and non-ferrous materials, metal matrix composite materials and also variety of
joint types can be produced (proper fixture should be designed and manufactured to hold the work pieces firmly
during operation).

It is a process where, Ferrous to Non-Ferrous materials can be welded; the workpieces were joined under
the pressure or a combination of both heat and pressure. The base metal remains in the solid state, because the
temperature will not be more than the melting point of the base metal. If external heat is applied, it should be lower
than base metal melting point temperature.

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524 Prashant S. Humnabad & M. S. Ganesha Prasad

Figure 1 shows Friction Stir Welding (FSW) which is one of the kind of Deformation welding process.

Figure 1: Schematic Representation of Friction Stir Welding

A newly developed technique Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is the new trend in solid state joining method and used
for aluminium alloy, as well as for magnesium, copper, titanium and steel. It was first developed and experimented by W.
Thomas at The Welding Institute (TWI), UK, in December 1991.

Friction-Stir Welding (FSW) is a solid-state joining process (the metal is not melted, the metal turns into paste
form which is pressed in the gap between two plates by the moving tool shoulder. Hence this paste joins both the plates).
It mechanically intermixes the two pieces of metal at the place of the join, then softens them so the metal can be fused
using mechanical pressure.

Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is used for the applications where original metal characteristics must remain
unchanged as far as possible. It is a continuous hot shear process involving a non-consumable, rotating probe of harder
material than the base metals to be joined. The friction between the rotating tool and the work-piece heats and softens the
metal adjacent to the tool so that it can readily flow around. Thus, the sources of heat in FSW are: The friction between the
tool and work-piece and The severe plastic deformation occurring in the material.

Friction Stir Welding was used already in routine, as well as in critical applications for the joining of structural
components mainly made of aluminium and its alloys. However, further studies are still being carried out in order to obtain
a more robust "process window". The friction stir welding joints between steel and aluminium alloy have been reported
earlier [1-4]. In fact, Kimapong and Watanabe have reported that a sound butt joint between AA5083 and steel was
successfully formed by FSW [5].

MATERIAL AND EXPERIMENTATION

The materials selected for the present research work are commercially available Mild-Steel and Aluminium-7xxx
in the form of plates of size (lbh) 100 x 50 x 4 mm respectively.

Mild-Steel Properties: Table 1 illustrates the Mechanical Properties of Mild-Steel.

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Table 1: Mechanical Properties of Mild Steel

Aluminum 7xxx Properties

The Aluminium-7xxx is very strong among all aluminium alloys. It is well known for its high strength, which
makes it is very useful in aerospace, aviation, marine and transportation applications. The Trade names of 7xxx are Zicral,
Ergal, and Fortal Constructal. Some of the 7xxx series alloys sold under brand names, such as Alumec 79, Alumec 89,
Contal, Certal, Alumould, and Hokotol [44].

Table 2: Mechanical Properties of Aluminum-7xxx

Parameters Selected

Parameters considered to conduct the experiments by Friction Stir Welding with different preheating conditions to
join aluminium 7xxx with Mild-Steel for constant thickness up-to 04 mm were carried out. Preheating of base materials is
done along with (just before) Friction Stir Welding for following combinations. An L9 Orthogonal Array (33) was selected
for current research work to optimize the process parameters of Preheated Friction Stir Welding of Mild-Steel and
Aluminium 7075. This array requires nine trial runs and has three columns.

Table 3 Process Parameters for Preheated Friction Stir Welding

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526 Prashant S. Humnabad & M. S. Ganesha Prasad

WELDING PROCESS

All welds were made on a moderated milling machine with a suitable FSW tool and joints were butt welded for
selected parameters for 9-Sets of experiments and post weld joints were subjected to NDT testing, then mechanical and
microstructural examinations to examine the joint properties.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The Table 4 shows the Mechanical Test Results of ‘With Preheated Friction Stir Welded’ joints, which were
subjected to process optimization by TAGUCHI’S method to analyse best combination of parameters to get better joint
strength.

Table 4: Tensile, Impact and Hardness Results of Preheated FSW Joints

Tesile Strength

Figure 2 shows the effect of preheat temperature on the tensile strength of FSWed dissimilar materials.
The maximum strength of joint fabricated at travel speed 16 mm/min, rotational speed 1400 rpm, and preheating
temperature 150 º C. The results indicate that the tensile strength of Preheated-FSW welds is improved with increase in
preheating temperature up to some optimum value.

“Figure 2: Tensile Strength of Joints Welded at Different Process Parameters”

Figure 2 depicts the percentage of elongation for tensile test specimens. There is remarkable difference in
percentage of elongation for friction stir welded with-preheated specimens for all the experiments. The experiment – 2
shows more percent of elongation compared to other experiments, due to better mixing of (Al and Fe) dissimilar materials.

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Stir Welded Dissimilar Materials with
Different Preheating Conditions

Figure 3: Comparisons between the Percentage of

Elongation for Preheated FSW Joints

ToughnessTo

From the experimental results it was observed that the impact strength is almost same for experiment number – 02
and 06, whereas lower impact strength is observed for lower rotational speed / lower preheating temperature and at higher
rotational speed / higher preheating temperature. It is also observed that higher impact strength is achieved if rotational
speed is greater than 1000 rpm.

“Figure 4: Impact Strength of Joints Welded at Different Process Parameters”

Hardness Number

The microhardness profiles of all joints were measured at the center line of the cross section of the weld i.e., at stir
zone (Nugget Zone). The average hardness value at the nugget zone of experiments 1 - 9 are 89.33, 230, 70.66, 100.66,
137.33, 215.66, 136.66, 180.33 and 188.33 HV respectively. From hardness diagram, it was revealed that the TMAZ -
MILD-STEEL hardness value is considerably higher than HAZ - MILD-STEEL.

From the experimental results, it can be illustrated that higher hardness value was observed for traverse speed 16
mm/min, rotational speed 1400 RPM and preheating temperature 150ºC, whereas a lower hardness value was observed for
16 mm/min, rotational speed 2000 RPM and preheating temperature 200ºC.

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528 Prashant S. Humnabad & M. S. Ganesha Prasad

Figure 5: Hardness Number (VHN) at Various Zones

Micro Structural Calculations

Figure 6: Microstructural Results of Experiment – 2”

The Figure 6 shows the microscopic characteristics of welded joint for experiment - 2. It was observed that few
scattered Mild-Steel particle movement after straining, it may be due to preheating, frictional heat and forward movement
of the tool. A small Mild-Steel particle was diffused nearby interface. The precipitated Fe-Al was fully diffused at nugget
zone and also seen at the interface (i.e. good intermetallic bonding between atoms at interface).

CONCLUSIONS

The results related to mechanical and physical properties of preheated friction stir welding with
different conditions were summarized as below:

• From the mechanical test results it is observed that, the joint strength of Preheated Friction Stir Welding is better
than Without-Preheated Friction Stir Welding joints, this is mainly better mixing of both the material due to
preheating the work-piece.

• The strength of joint increased by around 12% when joining was done With-Preheated Friction Stir Welding.

• The tool life was increased when joints were done with preheated FSW.

• Plunging was quite easy in preheated FSW as compared to without preheated FSW.

• Better (IMC) intermetallic composition in preheated FSW at weld zone as compared to without preheated FSW.

Impact Factor (JCC): 7.6197 SCOPUS Indexed Journal NAAS Rating: 3.11
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Different Preheating Conditions
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