Abstract
In recent years, the mechanical clinching method plays an increasingly important role in the building of thin-walled structures. The clinched joint can be employed to join the lightweight materials. Compared with other joining methods, the clinched joint has better mechanical behavior. However, the clinched joint may be deformed during use when it bears a high shear force. In this research, a process to join aluminum alloy and restore deformed joint was proposed and investigated. The clinched joint was deformed in the deforming process. Then, a customized rivet and two flat restoring tools were utilized for restoring the deformed joint to join aluminum alloy. Different restoring forces such as 45, 40, 35, 30, 25, and 20 kN were employed to produce diverse restored joints. Some shearing tests on the restored joint were utilized for understanding joint material flow, mode of failure, thickness of neck, shear strength, and absorption of energy. The thickness of neck can be increased in restoring process, which contributes to improve the shear strength. The rivet embedded in a pit also helps restored joint bear shear force, so all of the restored joints have higher absorption of energy and shear strength than the clinched joints. The restoring process effectively restores the deformed joint to obtain better mechanical behavior.
Highlights
With the development of lightweight structures, more and more light materials such as titanium alloy and aluminum alloy are utilized for building lightweight structures [1,2,3]
Some shearing tests on the restored joint were utilized for understanding joint material flow, mode of failure, thickness of neck, shear strength, and absorption of energy
A customized rivet and two flat tools were utilized for restoring the deformed joint in a single stroke
Summary
With the development of lightweight structures, more and more light materials such as titanium alloy and aluminum alloy are utilized for building lightweight structures [1,2,3]. The joining of light materials is an important issue in the realm of joining technology [4]. Welding technique is a widely used joining technology to build the automotive structure. Because of high thermal conductivity, the natural surface oxide layer, and other problems, it is hard for the welding technique to connect the light materials [5]. Self-pierce riveting is one of the mechanical joining technologies which are suitable for joining light materials [7,8,9]. The sheets joined by self-pierce riveting technology can gain a high static strength
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