Grey relational analysis of friction stir welding parameters for the development of dissimilar joints between AA6082 and AA7075

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this research, the dissimilar metals of AA6082 and AA7075 were joined using friction stir welding process with H13 steel as tool material. The parameters such as tool profile, rotational and traverse speeds were selected at three different levels. Taguchi L-9 array was selected to design the experiments. The response factors namely, ultimate tensile strength, % of elongation, hardness and impact strength were considered for optimising FSW parameters. The mechanical properties were evaluated by conducting tension test, hardness test and impact test according to ASTM standards. Taguchi Grey Relational Analysis was used to find the rank of each experiment. From GRA, an optimum parameters were observed at 2nd experimentation i.e. tool profile as circular geometry, tool speed at 900 rpm and feed rate at 40 mm/min. Further, analysis of variance was performed to determine the percentage of contribution of the welding parameters on the responses viz., tensile strength, % of elongation, hardness and impact strength. From the ANOVA grey relational analysis, order of effecting parameters was tool profile (33%) followed by feed rate (32%) and tool speed (26%) on output factors.