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Friction stir welded and deep drawn multi-material tailor welded blanks

Published/Copyright: July 8, 2019
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Materials Testing
From the journal Materials Testing Volume 61 Issue 7

Abstract

The ever increasing demand for more resource-efficient and safer vehicles in today's automotive industry makes lightweight construction techniques necessary. However, overcoming contradicting requirements arising from lightweight design and safety remains a challenging task. The extent to which lightweight measures can be applied in order to save fuel, heavily depends on the fact that rising safety requirements have to be met by increasing strength of parts. This contradicting demand for parts with high strength and low weight leads to the development of new production technologies. One example, regarding car body components, is the tailor welded blank (TWB) technology. In tailor welded blanks, materials and thicknesses are locally adapted to meet the needed strength and strain properties while keeping the weight as low as possible. While tailor welded blanks consisting of similar materials with different thicknesses are already used in vehicles, the use of TWBs with dissimilar materials, e.g. steel and aluminum, is still in development due to the problems in joining dissimilar materials. Especially when manufacturing parts made of TWBs through joining and subsequent deep drawing, the joint needs to have very good strength properties in order not to fail during forming. One way to overcome these joining difficulties is friction stir welding. In this paper, a methodology is presented to produce multi-material tailor welded blanks with varying thicknesses through friction stir welding (FSW) and deep drawing in a subsequent step. A newly developed FSW joint configuration is used to weld steel sheets in 1 mm thickness to 2 mm thick aluminum sheets. A welding parameter study is conducted to investigate the influence of the process parameters on the joint quality. Tensile and Nakajima tests show that the joint strength, obtained with optimal process parameters, exceeds the strength of the steel base material. Thus, failure occurs in the steel, whereas the joint remains intact. The friction stir welded blanks were furthermore deep drawn. Two different tool approaches were tested to compensate the different sheet thicknesses during the forming process. Using the more suitable approach, blanks were deep drawn with three different punch geometries to show the potential of friction stir welding for the manufacturing of multi-material tailor welded blanks.

∗Correspondence Address, Florian Panzer, M.Sc., Materialprüfungsanstalt (MPA), Universität Stuttgart, Abteilung Fügetechnik und Additive Fertigung, Referat Fügeverfahren, Pfaffenwaldring 32, D-70569 Stuttgart, Germany, E-mail:

Florian Panzer joined the Materials Testing Institute (MPA) University of Stuttgart in 2018 as a research assistant in the unit “Welding and Joining Technology”. After receiving his Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Stuttgart in 2016, he started to work as a research assistant at the Institute for Materials Testing, Materials Science and Strength of Materials (IMWF) of the University of Stuttgart, Germany. The focus of his current work is on the joining of dissimilar materials with friction stir welding, as well as on the experimental and numerical investigation of the dynamics of the friction stir welding process.

Matthias Schneider studied Mechanical Engineering (Dipl.-Ing.) at Friedrich-Alexander-University in Erlangen-Nürnberg. His majors were Production Engineering and Plastics Technology. He joined the University of Stuttgart, Germany in 2013 and since then has been working in the field of sheet metal forming. His principal task is the development of new sheet metal forming tools and technologies.

Dipl.-Ing. Martin Werz joined the Materials Testing Institute (MPA) University of Stuttgart in 2016, as Head of the “Welding and Joining Technology” unit. Since 2017, he has been Head of the Department “Joining Technology and Additive Manufacturing”. In 2011, he earned his Master's degree at George Washington University in Washington, DC, USA, on the topic “Transportation Safety Engineering”. In 2012, he completed his degree (Dipl.-Ing.) in the field of Mechanical Engineering and started to work as an academic staff member at the Institute for Materials Testing, Materials Science and Strength of Materials (IMWF) of the University of Stuttgart, Germany. In 2016, he obtained a degree as welding engineer. He regularly participates in ScienceSlams, where scientists present their research work in front of a non-expert audience, and won the German ScienceSlam Championships in 2017 with his slam title “Friction Stir Welding in the Kitchen” (“Rührreibschweißen in der Küche”). He shows great interest in the correlations between process parameters, material properties and the resulting joint strength. Aside from experimental process studies and optimizations, he is engaged in the continuum mechanical modeling and simulation of the friction stir welding process.

Prof. Dr. Stefan Weihe has been Director of the Materials Testing Institute (MPA) University of Stuttgart as well as Head and Full Professor of the Institute of Materials Testing, Materials Science and Strength of Materials (IMWF) of the University of Stuttgart, Germany, since 08/2014. He received his doctorate in Aerospace Engineering at the Institute for Statics and Dynamics of Aerospace Structures, University of Stuttgart in 1998 and afterwards began working as a Senior Expert for Chassis Strength, Friction and Wear for Audi AG, Ingolstadt, Germany. From 2002 to 2014, he was a Senior Manager in the field of Strength and Fatigue, Body in White, and Body Concepts and Advanced Engineering in the Development & Research Department, Division Mercedes-Benz Vans, Daimler AG, Stuttgart, Germany.

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Published Online: 2019-07-08
Published in Print: 2019-07-04

© 2019, Carl Hanser Verlag, München

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Inhalt/Contents
  2. 10.3139/120.019061
  3. Fachbeiträge/Technical Contributions
  4. Effect of rhenium and cobalt additions on the microstructure and gamma prime phase stability of vacuum arc melted modified nickel-based superalloys grade MGA 1400
  5. Residual strength of fire-exposed glass-reinforced epoxy composite pipes
  6. Impact attenuator conceptual design using lightweight materials and meta-modeling technique
  7. Microstructure and properties of high strength Al-Fe-Cu-Si-Zn alloy (AA8079) produced by mechanical alloying and powder metallurgy
  8. Determination of the static, dynamic and cyclic properties of the heat affected zone for different steel grades
  9. Friction stir welded and deep drawn multi-material tailor welded blanks
  10. Effects of cut-outs on the vibrational characteristics of a hollow shaft system
  11. Effect of heat treatment on wear and corrosion behavior of high chromium white cast iron
  12. Effect of nanoparticle reinforcement on mechanical properties and erosion–corrosion behavior of cast aluminum
  13. Effect of different grain sizes on the static strain aging behavior of bake hardening steel
  14. Effect of fillers on vinylester matrix composites
  15. Impact of oxygen doping on AC impedance, complex dielectric and electrical modulus spectra of a Hg-Ba-Ca-Cu-O ceramic
  16. Effect of TiBAl inoculation on abrasive wear resistance of high Cr white cast iron
  17. Stress shielding reduction via graded porosity of a femoral stem implant
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https://doi.org/10.3139/120.111366

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Inhalt/Contents
  2. 10.3139/120.019061
  3. Fachbeiträge/Technical Contributions
  4. Effect of rhenium and cobalt additions on the microstructure and gamma prime phase stability of vacuum arc melted modified nickel-based superalloys grade MGA 1400
  5. Residual strength of fire-exposed glass-reinforced epoxy composite pipes
  6. Impact attenuator conceptual design using lightweight materials and meta-modeling technique
  7. Microstructure and properties of high strength Al-Fe-Cu-Si-Zn alloy (AA8079) produced by mechanical alloying and powder metallurgy
  8. Determination of the static, dynamic and cyclic properties of the heat affected zone for different steel grades
  9. Friction stir welded and deep drawn multi-material tailor welded blanks
  10. Effects of cut-outs on the vibrational characteristics of a hollow shaft system
  11. Effect of heat treatment on wear and corrosion behavior of high chromium white cast iron
  12. Effect of nanoparticle reinforcement on mechanical properties and erosion–corrosion behavior of cast aluminum
  13. Effect of different grain sizes on the static strain aging behavior of bake hardening steel
  14. Effect of fillers on vinylester matrix composites
  15. Impact of oxygen doping on AC impedance, complex dielectric and electrical modulus spectra of a Hg-Ba-Ca-Cu-O ceramic
  16. Effect of TiBAl inoculation on abrasive wear resistance of high Cr white cast iron
  17. Stress shielding reduction via graded porosity of a femoral stem implant
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