Influence of Accelerated Cooling Condition on Welding Thermal Cycle, Residual Stress, and Deformation in SM490A Steel ESW Joint

Abstract

Electro-slag welding (ESW) has been widely used to join the box column because of high productivity. The heat input of ESW is far larger than those of other fusion welding processes, so ESW usually results in a long holding time over certain elevated temperature (∆t H time), a long cooling time from 800 to 500 °C (∆t 8/5 time), and a wide heat-affected zone (HAZ). It can be foreseen that the mechanical properties especially fracture toughness of the fusion zone and HAZ will be inferior to those of base metal. As a fundamental research, a computational approach based on MSC.Marc code was developed to simulate the thermo-mechanical behaviors in a typical SM490A steel ESW joint under different cooling conditions. Meanwhile, the thermal cycles computed by numerical model were compared with the experimental measurements. Moreover, the influence of accelerated cooling methods on welding residual stress and deformation was examined numerically. Simulation results show that accelerated cooling methods not only can largely shorten ∆t H time as well as ∆t 8/5 time and reduce the size of HAZ, but also can affect the residual stress distribution and deformation. It is believed that the accelerated cooling methods proposed by this study potentially improve the mechanical properties of ESW joint.