An investigation into the effect of welding parameters on fatigue crack growth rate and fracture toughness in friction stir welded copper sheets

Abstract

In the present study, the effect of various factors of friction stir welding including rotational and traverse speeds of tool and in fact, the amount of the heat transferred within welding was evaluated on the resistance to fatigue crack growth and fracture toughness in different zones of welding copper sheets. In order to better assess these two properties, other mechanical properties such as tensile strength and hardness were also studied and the microstructure of different zones of welds was investigated using optic and electron microscopies. By doing this study, it became clear that the less the heat transferred to the plunging during the welding process, the better properties the resulting welds will have which well justifies the use of cooling in this study. Transferring heat to plunging causes the growth of grains in various zones and can cause the fatigue crack growth in heat-affected zone to increase averagely about 4.2 times the base material for different Δ K. In contrast, the occurrence of dynamic recrystallization in the stir zone as well as fragmentizing and alignment of grains in this zone can increase the resistance to fatigue crack growth up to 9-fold the resistance of the base material. The other interesting result of this study was that although the properties of stir zone improve by increasing the number of welding passes, the properties of its weakest zone i.e. the heat-affected zone will decline.