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Francesco Lambiase
Alfonso Paoletti
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Antoniomaria Di Ilio
Universit degli Studi dell'Aquila
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ScienceDirect
Procedia CIRP 00 (2014) 000000
www.elsevier.com/locate/procedia
9th CIRP Conference on Intelligent Computation in Manufacturing Engineering - CIRP ICME '14
Abstract
Friction stir spot welding (FSSW) of thermoplastic materials has been recently developed. Early investigations have proved that such joining
technology allows achieving high quality joints over conventional welding processes. In this paper, Friction spot stir welding is applied to
Polycarbonate sheets of 3 mm thickness. A prototypal setup is developed to monitor the evolution of main forces and tool temperature during the
joining phases. The influence of the main process parameters on the joints strength has been assessed by mean of single lap shear test on single
joint. The joints quality has been also assessed by means of optical microscopy analysis. Finally an Artificial Neural Network has been developed
in order to predict the mechanical behavior of the welded joints.
2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.
Peer-review under responsibility of the International Scientific Committee of 9th CIRP ICME Conference".
Keywords:Joining, Polymers, Modelling, Polymer, Friction Stir Welding
1. Introduction
Thermoplastic materials are widely employed in different
industrial and engineering applications in order to reduce
product weight, thermal conductivity and to enhance toughness
and stress-to-weight ratio. Joining methods for similar and
dissimilar polymer structures are used in the automotive
industry [1, 2]. Polymer welding methods are typically divided
into three categories: techniques based on heat conduction,
processes based on heat radiation and friction welding methods.
In the Friction Stir Welding (FSW) process, a nonconsumable, rotating tool with a specific geometry is plunged
into and traversed through the material. The two key
components of the tool are the shoulder and the pin (probe).
During welding, the pin travels in the material, while the
shoulder rubs along the surface. Heat is generated by the tool
shoulder rubbing on the surface and by the pin mixing the
material below the shoulder. This mixing action permits the
material to be transferred across the joint line, allowing a weld
to be made without any melting of the material. Other than the
linear process described above, another major variation of the
process is Friction Stir Spot Welding (FSSW). The FSSW
process involves only the plunge and retraction of the FSW tool,
thus eliminating the traverse part of the process. The FSSW
2. Experimental setup
Temperature
measuring
field
13 mm
3 mm
4,3 mm
11 mm
Shoulder
Pin
5 mm
Symbol
vf
Fig. 4. Typical phases of friction stir spot welding process: pre-heating, joining,
consolidation and tool retraction.
n
Pt
Dt
Wt
High level
[+1]
46
5400
20
20
20
250
1200
Pt = 20 s
Dt = 20 s
Wt = 0 s
Vf = 8 mm/min
n = 5400 rpm
150
4,9 mm
4,3 mm
100
3 mm
Fmax
Fc
800
400
Fss
dr
0
0
0.00
30
Torque, C [N cm]
Vf = 8 mm/min
n = 5400 rpm
Fr
50
1.00
2.00
3.00
4.00
Axial displacement, s [mm]
5.00
Pt = 20 s
Dt = 20 s
Wt = 0 s
Vf = 8 mm/min
n = 5400 rpm
20
4,9 mm
4,3 mm
L
10
Cmax
Cc
3 mm
H
C1
0
0.00
120
Temperature, T [C]
200
Pt = 20 s
Dt = 20 s
Wt = 0 s
1.00
2.00
3.00
4.00
Axial displacement, s [mm]
5.00
4,9 mm
Vf = 8 mm/min
n = 5400 rpm
Pt = 20 s
Dt = 20 s
Wt = 0 s
W
Tmax
U
T2
80
R
4,3 mm
40
3 mm
0
0.00
1.00
2.00
3.00
4.00
Axial displacement, s [mm]
5.00
0.00
0.40
0.80
1.20
1.60
Displacement, d [mm]
2.00
RMSE
Training
0.20
0.18
0.16
0.14
0.12
0.10
0.08
0.06
0.04
0.02
1
3
Validation
Testing
Overall
References
5
11
13
15
17
19
Number of Neurons
Fig. 9. Trend of RMSE by varying N in the hidden layer of the network.
ANN prediction
500
400
300
200
Fmax
100
Cmax
0
0
100
200
300
400
500
Measured
ANN prediction
1600
1200
800
400
Fr
0
0
400
800
1200
1600
Measured
Fig. 10. Comparison between experimental data and Neural Network
predictions.
5. Conclusions
Friction stir spot welding of thermoplastic materials is a
promising technique because of some advantages over other
joining technologies, as the low cost of machine and tooling
cost. In such conditions very high strengths may be obtained,
close to the strength of the base material.
The effect of friction stir spot welding parameters on the
maximum plunging force, maximum torque and joint strength