An Electrode Extension Model for
Gas Metal Arc Welding
Short circuiting transfer can be predicted within 9%
for a given electrode feed speed
BY T. P. Q U I N N , R. B. M A D I G A N A N D T. A. SIEWERT
ABSTRACT. The electrode extension dur-
ing gas metal arc welding is predicted
using a one-dimensional model of the
melting electrode. Joule heating in the
electrode, heat directly applied to the
end of the electrode from the condensing
electrons, and heat transferred from the
droplet, together with conduction along
the electrode are considered. The ther-
mal conductivity, the thermal diffusivity,
and the electrical resistivity of the elec-
trode material are allowed to vary with
temperature. The steady-state electrode
extension is predicted to an accuracy of
1.9 mm (0.074 in.). The onset of short-
circuiting as the current is decreased for
a given electrode feed speed is predicted
within 9%. Dynamic analysis shows that
the gas metal arc welding process acts as
a low-pass filter for electrode extension
with respect to the square of the current
(proportional to power) and with respect
to electrode feed speed. As the mean
welding current is increased, the elec-
trode extension (or arc length if the con-
tact-tube-to-work distance is constant)
has a smaller response to perturbations in
the current or electrode feed speed. The
quasi-linear transfer functions between
electrode extension and current squared
and between electrode extension and
electrode feed speed can be described by
one zero, two pole parametric fits. The
transfer functions are linear in the ampli-
tude of the excitation up to 10% of the
mean excitation. The model transfer
functions were verified with experi-
ments.
75 P. QUINN, R. B. MADICAN and T. A. SIE-
WERT are with National Institute of Standards
and Technology Boulder, Colo.
Introduction
This paper presents a model for elec-
trode extension during gas metal arc
welding (GMAW). In GMAW, an arc is
created between the continuously fed,
consumable electrode and the work-
piece. The melted electrode acts as filler
metal in the weld. The length of the solid
electrode from the point of current trans-
fer to where the electrode is melted, the
electrode extension (EE) determines the
length of the arc and, therefore, the
amount of power used in the welding
process. Transfer mode (globular, spray,
etc.), arc stability, and deposition rate de-
pend on the EE (Ref. 1).
The way in which the metal is trans-
ferred from the electrode to the weld pool
affects the final shape and quality of the
weld (Ref. 1). Spray transfer (when the di-
ameters of the detached droplets are
equal to or smaller than the electrode di-
ameter) is the highest production transfer
mode. Short circuit transfer (when the
electrode comes into direct electrical
KEY WORDS
Electrode Extension
GMAW
One-dimension Model
Temperature Profile
Describing Function
Spray Transfer Mode
Welding Current
Electrode Feed Speed
Transfer Functions
Stefan Problem
W E L D I N G RESEARCH SUPPLEMENT I 241-s
contact with the workpiece) is often used
for thin or heat-sensitive materials (Ref.
1). It is desirable to be able to predict the
transfer mode from the process variables
both for automatic control and for weld
schedule design.
Halmoy (Refs. 2-4) neglected thermal
conduction and used an energy balance
at the tip of the electrode to calculate the
steady state (Ref. 2) and dynamic melting
rates (Ref. 4), as well as the EE. He as-
sumed a fixed EE and heat generation
from the arc and Joule heating. Waszink
and van den Heuvel (Ref. 5) assumed a
fixed EE and included the effects of con-
duction, the Thomson effect, radiation,
and Joule heating. They found the losses
from radiative heat transfer and the
Thomson effect to be about two orders of
magnitude less than the contributions of
Joule heating and heat from the arc. Con-
ductive heat transfer was larger than or of
the same order of magnitude as Joule
heating in about the first 25% of the elec-
trode from the contact point. The heat
conducted from the liquid at the elec-
trode tip was 33% of the total Joule heat-
ing at 137 A and 1 1 % of the total Joule
heating at 238 A for the 1.2-mm (0.045-
in.) steel electrode they studied. Data for
the EE, current and electrode feed speed
or wire feed speed were experimentally
determined.
Kim, et al. (Ref. 6), concluded that an
energy balance approach was "inade-
quate to explain the observed melting
phenomena." Using a steady state, two-
dimensional model with conduction, he
predicted the temperature distribution in
the electrode. Again, EE, current and
electrode feed speed were determined
experimentally. He modeled the heat
transferred to the melting tip of the solid
 heating, heat from electrons that con- tion heat is applied directly to the solid
r^H dense directly on the solid electrode, and electrode at z = £ giving
Contact heat transferred from the liquid drop at
Tube
the electrode tip was developed for the QA = YVCI
spray transfer mode. The resulting set of (5)
UJ
S
Ohmic
Heating
I2r(T)
T< y
T partial differential equations
one-phase Stefan problem) was solved
(a where V c is the apparent condensation
voltage and y is the fraction of electrons
a. A
-S
0
1 for the transient and steady-state cases. that condense on the solid electrode. As
O vz
Quasi-linear transfer functions (using the shown in the appendix, the rate of heat
_i Heat 0

UJ from ii method of describing functions (Ref. 9) transferred from the melt can be approx-
Condensing Ul
> Electrons between EE and the square of the current imated by
Ui
°A ^ and EE and electrode feed speed were de-
a ^~~~--* veloped. The transfer functions describe Vc(\-y)l
X
o v^m
Q /' V r
HGat from
H
TD
the dynamic relationship between the
input, current squared or electrode feed
Qn
2 (6)
QC Liquid
Melt speed, and the output, EE. y must be determined experimentally. As
<
Ui seen in the appendix, the equations are
W) first nondimensionalized and then
Ul F/g. 1 — The melting electrode model. Model
solved using a finite difference method.
cc The equations governing steady-state
Neglecting heat losses due to the
electrode as coming from two sources: Thomson effect and radiation, the one- heat transfer and their method of solution
heat transferred from the liquid, and heat dimensional governing equation for the are also shown in the appendix.
directly delivered to the solid electrode rate of heat transfer in the electrode is There is a lack of data across the tem-
by the arc. perature range of interest (room temper-
There has been no attempt known to _d_ dT),l2(t)r(T) ature to melting point) for the thermal dif-
the authors to predict EE from the process K(Ty fusivity a(T), electrical resistivity r(T) and
variables (current, electrode feed speed, dzKy'dzj A* thermal conductivity K(T) for the low-
electrode composition, and electrode di- carbon steel electrode (E100S-1) used in
ameter) using a model that includes con- dZ dt ) the experiments; y is also unknown. To
duction. approximate the material properties, the
(1)
Dynamic models of G M A W are data for pure Fe (Refs. 13-15) are used
needed to facilitate control of the (see Fig. 1). Here, T is temperature; K is and corrected for the material used in the
process. Wu and Richardson (Ref. 7) used experiments. (For pure Fe, the data at the
thermal conductivity; I is current; r is re-
Halmoy's model of the electrode (Ref. 4) melting point have an estimated uncer-
sistivity; A is the cross-sectional area; v z
in an overall dynamic model of the entire tainty of ±20%, so a similar procedure
is electrode feed speed, c is specific heat
GMAW process. Kannatey-Asibu (Ref. 8) would be required even if a pure Fe elec-
and p is the density. The boundary con- trode were used.) The data for Fe are mul-
used an experimentally identified first-
ditions are tiplied by a constant over the temperature
order equation to model the dynamics of
the arc length where EE plus arc length is range. To find the multiplication con-
equal to the contact-tube-to-work dis- T ( Z = 0) = Tc, stants for the material properties and to
tance (CTWD). find y, the error between the experimen-
T(Z = £(t)) = Tm
The purposes of this research were: 1) tal steady-state EE £ss and the model 4s
(2) minimized as the constants are varied.
develop a dynamic and steady-state where Tc is the temperature of the con-
model that predicts EE for GMAW from Grid searches ranging ±15% around the
tact tube and T m is the melting tempera- nominal values of Fe with 5% steps are
the other process variables; 2) determine
ture. An additional condition is neces- used to find a(T m ), r(Tm), K(Tm). y was var-
the steady-state process variables at
which short circuit transfer takes place; sary because the boundary moves with ied between 0.05 and 0.25 in 0.005 steps.
and 3) quasi-linearize the model to a set time: To understand the dynamics of the
of transfer functions for use in automatic system around the steady-state solutions,
, ,9T QA(t) Qjt) the method of describing functions (Ref.
control. A thermal conduction model
I '' JdZ
7 A A
that includes heat sources from Joule 9) is used. Approximate transfer func-
p(T)Lz{t tions between the dimensionless EE s(t) =
t/£0 and the dimensionless, volumetric
(3)
Joule heat generation
(the energy balance at the tip of the solid
Table 1 — Optimal Material Constants and y electrode). Here, Q A is the rate of heat
for E100S-1 and Nominal Material Constants
for Fe (Refs. 12-15). The Nominal Values for Fe transfer to the solid electrode from con- MO yK{Tm ){Tn
Were Used Except Where Noted densing electrons (z=i ). Q m is the rate of
and between s and the Peclet number
heat transfer from the liquid melt. This set
fe E100S-1 of equations with the addition of the ini-
a(T m ), m 2 /s 6.30 X 1CT6 6.93 X 1 0 - 6 tial conditions, W it =
a(Tm )
K(Tm), W / ( m . K ) 34.6 31.1
r(Tm), /jQ-rn 1.32 1.52 *(f = 0) = y are calculated. W and q.- are varied about
2.72 X 103 —
L, J/kg T(Z,t- oW„ their steady-state values W ss and q i s s :
T m , °C 1510 — (4)
c(T m ),J/(kg.K) 751 — is a one-phase Stefan problem (Ref. 10). -a .sin(2n:(or)
4 y'ss ' aqJq •
Vc, V 6.00 — Following the developments of Kim
7 — 0.08 W- • W„ +a,A,sin(2nan)
(Ref. 11), a percentage of the condensa-
(7)

242-s I OCTOBER 1 9 9 4
where aqj and a w are the amplitudes of
the oscillations.
16.0- • ,''
ta(Tm) jk
14.0- y'' A

to B
~ 12.0-
± y A.

. * • *
t
A
is the Fourier number, and co is the di- H 10.0- y A.
TJ
mensionless frequency of oscillation.
The response of s in x is then calculated 1 8 "°-
•H
A y

using the temperature distribution of the s. 6 -°- y' 4k

steady-state solution as the initial condi- Fig. 2 — Model

tion. To calculate the magnitude and
phase of the transfer function at co, a and
\\t are found in
s =a sin(tm+ yr)
(8)
through a least squares fit. The magni-
tude of the transfer function at co is then
predicted to be a/aq:. The phase of the
transfer function is predicted by \|f. Once
transfer function data at discrete fre-
quencies are determined, parametric, ra-
tional curves are fitted to the transfer
functions according to the procedure of
Lin and Wu (Ref. 16).
Experiments
Bead-on-plate welds were made with
a 1.14 mm (0.045 in.) E100S-1 electrode,
1 5-22 mm (0.6-0.9 in.) CTWD, and 95%
Ar-5% C 0 2 gas. A low-noise regulator
was used as described in Ref. 1 7 to main-
tain constant current. To obtain EE mea-
surements, a 10 mW He-Ne laser and
632-nm bandpass filter were used to cre-
ate a shadowgraph of the electrode and
base plate (Ref. 17). The shadowgraph
images were recorded on a high-speed
video system. The contact tube, the elec-
trode, and the workpiece were imaged.
The current was measured with a Hall
effect transducer with an absolute error
of 1 % . The voltage between the torch
and the baseplate was measured within
0.5% absolute error. The axial velocity of
the electrode or feed speed (vz) was mea-
sured as the electrode entered the wire
feeder. A pinch roller (16 mm diameter)
was attached to an optical encoder (5000
pulses/rev) and the resulting pulse train
was frequency converted to give a volt-
age signal proportional to v z . The rms un-
certainty from calibration tests for the
transducer was 2 mm/s.
Experiments were undertaken to de-
velop and verify the model for steady-
state conditions. The welding current,
4.0- y ^
• r
2.0-
""
'0.0 2.0 4.0
model. The I 2 or v z was varied sinu-
soidally about a mean value at selected
frequencies; v z or I, respectively, was
maintained constant. The data recording
rates were reduced because of the rela-
tively long data recording period (~30 s).
Here, the voltage, v z ; and current were
sampled at 210 samples/s after being
low-pass filtered with a cutoff frequency
of 100 Hz. The video data were recorded
at 250 frames/s.
The end of the solid electrode was de-
fined as the point midway between
where the electrode starts to neck (spray
transfer) and where droplets formed. The
point of current transfer was assumed to
be at the exit of the contact tube. The EE
was determined from the video data by
counting the number of pixels between
the contact tube and electrode end frame
by frame. For the dynamic experiments
the EE was measured automatically to
within about 0.9 mm by capturing the
video data frame by frame and detecting
the outline of the electrode using an
image processor.
The phase and amplitude of the cur-
rent squared or electrode feed speed and
the EE in the dynamic experiments were
determined by least-squares fitting the
data with a sine wave. The EE to current
or EE to electrode feed speed transfer
function were then constructed by taking
the ratio of the magnitudes IIJ?/I 2 II or
ll<?/vzll and taking the difference in the
500i
450-
Model
400-
Experiment
350-
h6
300
electrode extension
\ Mndpl = ^xr*1 rim ent
calculated using the
parameters in Table 1
6.0 8.0 10.0 12.0 14.0 16.0 1f ,0
and the experimental
M o d e l ft (mm) electrode extension.
phases Z£-Z\2 or Z(-Zvz.
Result
Using the optimal material constants
and the optimal y (Table 1), the standard
deviation between the steady-state EE
measured in the experiments and the
steady-state EE predicted by the model is
1.9 mm for the E1 00S-1 electrode — Fig.
2. The steady-state model EE is derived
from the relationship between qj ss and
Wss-Fig.3.
Figure 3 can also be used to determine
a lower bound on the current at which
short circuiting will occur. By assigning
i0 = CTWD and using the optimal mate-
rial properties in Table 1, Fig. 3 can be
transformed to a relationship between
current and v z . Short circuiting will actu-
ally occur at currents higher than those
predicted because droplets will bridge
between the electrode tip and the weld
pool; the current predicted here is that
which would cause the electrode to enter
the weld pool. Using the data in Ref. 1 7,
the predicted short circuiting is com-
pared to the actual onset of short circuit-
ing — Fig. 4. The largest difference be-
tween the predicted and measured
currents at the onset of short circuiting is
9% at 187 mm/s (442 in./min).
For large W such as are produced
when v z or £0 is large, the model predicts
a steady-state temperature distribution
A"7
A A /
A/
/ A A

welding voltage and v2 signals were low- 2s 250-

pass filtered with a cutoff frequency of 200-

3000 Hz and recorded on a laboratory 150

computer at 8928 samples/s. The video 100
data were recorded at 3000 frames/s with t?
50 Fig. 3 — Model qy ss
0.2 mm/pixel resolution. The data were calculated using the
0
recorded for about 2 s during welding. 3 50 100 150 200 250 300 3 50
parameters of Table 1
Experiments were also conducted "s,Vz
and the experimental
Wss
under dynamic conditions to verify the «(TJ results.

WFI n i N O RFSFARGH SUPPI FMFNT I 243-s

 500-
450-
400-
350-
300-
2 250-
Fig. 4 — The model- 200-
predicted onset of short
150-
circuiting transfer as
the welding current is 100-
decreased, calculated
50-
using the parameters of
Table I and the experimen- o-
tal results. The CTWD
was 13 mm.
T-Tc
u= — co = 0.35 where it begins to roll off; for W
Tm-Tc
which is nearly linear in x = 7./£0 until a
point near the melting boundary is
reached where there is a sharp rise in u
— Fig. 5. For example, when W = 300.5,
u = 0.238 x for 0 < x < 0.98 with a cor-
relation coefficient of 0.998; 75% of the
increase in u occurs in the last 2% of the
electrode. For small W, u rises more grad-
ually; when W = 0.5, 75% of the increase
in u occurs in the last 23% of the elec-
trode — Fig. 5.
The dynamic response of EE to sinu-
soidal excitation in I 2 and v z shows a sin-
gle frequency response at the frequency
of the excitation (nonlinear systems can
show response at frequencies other than
the excitation frequency). The response
of the EE is characterized by the transfer
functions (Figs. 6, 7), which show that the
process acts as a low-pass filter for EE
with respect to I 2 and v z . The magnitude
of the transfer functions in s/q; and s/W
are essentially flat with increasing co until
the cutoff frequency is reached, after
w h i c h the magnitude decreases one
order of magnitude for a one-decade in-
crease in co. The magnitude decreases
with increasing W but the cutoff fre-
quency increases with increasing W. For
1.0 - i
Fig. 5 — Model
u 0.5 —
temperature
distribution
where
..Li, w{t)JM,
T„,-Tc w
a(Tm)
and x = Z /10.
244-s I OCTOBER 1994
Model
Experiment [17]
3 50 100 150 200 250 300
Vz(mm/s)
example, for W = 75, lls/qll = 0.16 until
= 425, lls/qll = 0.20 until W=20 where it
begins to roll off. For s/qj (or sAV), the
phase starts near 1 80 deg (0 deg for s/W)
for co « 1, passes through 90 deg (-90
deg for sAV), and returns above 90 deg
(-90 deg for s/W) as co increases.
The model prediction for <f/l2was
compared to experiment for v z = 0.12
m/s and sinusoidal oscillations in I 2 of
amplitude 7 to 10% of the mean I 2 =
62500 A 2 (I = 250 A) — Fig. 8. The rms
differences between the model predic-
tion and the experiment were 0.6 x 10 - 7
m/A2 in magnitude and 11 deg in phase;
the model prediction is reasonably close
to the experimental results. The model
prediction for £/vz was compared to ex-
periment for I = 250 A and sinusoidal os-
cillations in v z of 10% of the mean 0.12
m/s. The model again closely predicts the
experimental results; the rms differences
between the model prediction and the
experiment were 0.04 s_1 in magnitude
and 8 deg in phase.
The least squares parametric fits of the
transfer functions s/q.- and s/W (Figs. 6, 7)
were two pole, one zero models of the
form
If III
1
jjj i l l
lp!If
150^ 0.75
""a so
lp •^25
300-* 0 X speed.
1 + a, cr + a2 CT"
where a is the Laplace variable. For s/qj
at W = 75 and for s/W at mean W < 1 75,
the best fitting rational f u n c t i o n , ac-
cording to the criteria of Lin and Wu
(Ref. 16), is a one pole, no zero model
(bi = 0, a 2 = 0). For s/qj and s/W, a-, and
a 2 decrease with increasing mean W —
Figs. 10, 11. For s/qj, b 0 and b, increase
with increasing W (Fig. 12), but for s/W,
b 0 and b, decrease w i t h increasing
mean W — Fig. 1 3.
The transfer functions magnitude and
350
phase for s/qj and sAA/ were nearly inde-
pendent of tne excitation amplitude for
a q j <0.10q j s s and a w < 0 . 1 0 W s . For s/qj,
the identified parametric coefficients
with aqj = 0.075qj ss were within (4 x
1 0~4, 5 x 10- 6 , 8 x 1 0- 4 , 3 x 1 0-6) of the
(a,, a 2 , b 0 , b,) with aq: = 0 . 1 0 q j s s — Figs.
10, 12. For s/W, the identified parametric
coefficients with a w = 0.075W SS were
within (6 x 10- 3 , 2 x 1 0-f>, 2 x 10- 2 , 3 x
10- 6 ) of the (a 1; a 2 , b 0 , b,) with a w =
0.10WSS — Figs. 11, 13. Since
<2m
ry
9/ 2
A K(Tm)(Tm-Tr
a 10% perturbation in qj corresponds to
a 32% perturbation in I.
Discussion
The value of y found here, 0.08, is
near that predicted by Kim, et al. (Ref. 6),
of 0.1 < y < 0.25 for spray transfer. The
optimal values for cc(Tm), r(T m ), and K(Tm)
lie within 1 5% of the nominal values for
pure Fe, as would be expected for the
low-alloy steel E100S-1 used in the ex-
periments. There is a 20% uncertainty in
these material constants for Fe itself. Even
ifa(T m ), r(Tm), and K(Tm) for the electrode
were k n o w n , the steady-state experi-
ments would need to be conducted to de-
termine y. The prediction of the current
at the onset of short circuiting within 9%
offers an independent confirmation of
the model as does the data for the trans-
fer function seen in Figs. 8 and 9. The
(small) differences between the model
transfer functions and those found exper-
imentally (rms differences of 0.6 x 10~7
m/A2 in magnitude and 11 cleg in phase
for i/\2 and 0.04 s - 1 in magnitude and 8
deg in phase for U\7 indicate that the
model can be used to design and imple-
ment a control system for EE.
Dynamic analysis of the EE shows that
the EE, and hence arc length, becomes
1.00
more stable as the mean current (qj) in-
creases — the EE is less affected by per-
turbations in the current or wire feed
Conclusions
W Model Parametric Fit
75 a
1) A dynamic and steady-state model 225 o
that predicts electrode extension in the 425 « - - -
spray transfer mode of gas metal arc
welding has been developed. The model !
predicted the steady-state electrode ex- - .
tension within 1.9 mm and the current at 0.1
=
the onset of short circuiting within 9% for S
an E100S-1 electrode. ).01 ©- -- -€> -© & officaee D— O-O Geosear©- G - / * " ^ .
2) Dynamic analysis using the method — x -* x >exx»st— — -*< — x —x x-5?§Ji&»,
of describing functions shows that as the 0.001 - 1 l l l l l I i i ii i i i i iiiii i ii nm

welding current is increased, the elec-

180 Fig. 6 — The
trode extension (or arc length if the con-
transfer functions
tact-tube-to-work distance is constant)
of s/qj where
becomes more stable. Gas metal arc ~ 135
N& "O x
welding acts as a low-pass filter for elec- 10
trode extension with respect to the 5 90- ^*****^_VJ \t\/?K(Tm ){Tm-Tc)
mag = ~-?— -,
square of the current (proportional to OJ

power) and with respect to the electrode i I I i Mil 1 1 1 lllll 1 1 I 1 lllll 1 1 1 1 1 III phase - Zl - Zl2, and a> =
45 «(Tm)
feed speed. 0.01 0.1 1 10 100
3) The quasi-linear transfer functions f is the frequency . W -
0) *{Tm
between electrode extension and current
squared and between electrode exten-
sion and electrode feed speed can be de-
scribed by one zero, two pole paramet- W Model Parametric Fit
75 a
ric fits.
225 o
4) The transfer functions between the 425 x - - -
electrode extension and the current 1
squared are linear in the amplitude of the
current squared excitation up to 10% of
the mean current squared. The transfer 0.1
tn
functions between the electrode exten- ro
2
sion and the electrode feed speed are 0.01
also linear in the amplitude of the elec-
trode feed speed excitation up to 1 0% of 0.001
the mean electrode feed speed.
5) The dynamic response of the model 180
was verified by experiments: at a mean
Fig. 7 — The
current of 250 A and a mean electrode 135 transfer functions
feed speed of 0.12 m/s, the model trans- CO of s/W where
fer function between electrode extension CB

and current squared was within 0.6 x

10~7 m/A 2 in magnitude and 11 deg in
45 _i ni i I M
phase of the experimental results be- 0.01 0.1 1 50 100
and(0—7^-^rf; fis the frequency

tween 0.1 and 2 Hz. The model transfer «(U

co
function between electrode extension c[T„)
and electrode feed speed was within
0.04 s_1 in magnitude and 8 deg in phase
of the experimental results.
l.Op
References

1. American Welding Society, 1 9 9 1 . 0.1

Welding Handbook, Vol. 2, pp. 109-113, -
Miami, Fla. S
2. Halmoy, E. May 1979. Wire melting
rate, droplet temperature, and effective anode 0.01
melting potential. Int. Conf. Arc Physics and
Weld Pool Behavior, The Welding Institute, 0
London, England.
3. Halmoy, E. 1986. Electrode wire heat- -45
ing in terms of w e l d i n g parameters. The Fig. 8 — Model
Physics of Welding, ed. J. F. Lancaster, pp. -90 a Experiment transfer function t/P
330-336, Oxford, Pergamon Press. Si Model Prediction calculated using the
4. Halmoy, E„ and Broten, H. 1979. Dy- -135
values in Table 7 for
namic response of the wire melting rate. Pub- I I Mini _l I _J I vz = 0.12 m/s and
lic Session Bratislava, pp. 5 4 - 6 1 , Interna- -180
0.01 0.1 1.0 10.0 the mean I = 250 A
tional Institute of Welding. and the experimental
Frequency (Hz)
5. Waszink, J. H., and van den Heuvel, G. results.
J. 1979. Measurements and calculations of

WELDING RESEARCH SUPPLEMENT I 245-s

 o Amplitude = 7.5% of the itean 0 Amplitude = 7,5% of the mean
" Amplitude = 10.0% of the
x Amplitude = 10.0% 0 c rhe mean
la) 0.20 . . 2 •

5 6
0.16 . if.

0.12
.:.
0.08 0.08

0.04 s

«
n * 1 «
- O 1 n r

O) 2.4

2.0 -
„ l.(
9
1"
0.4 ®

150 250 35
K

Fig. 9 — Model transfer function calculated
using the values in Table I for a mean vz =
0.12 m/s and I = 250 A and the experimental
results.
the resistance of wire extension in arc weld-
ing. Int. Conf. Arc Physics and Weld Pool Be-
havior, pp. 227-239, The Welding Institute,
London, England.
6. Kim, Y.-S., McEligot, D. M., and Eagar,
T. W. 1991. Analyses of electrode heat trans-
fer in gas metal arc welding. Welding Journal,
70(1): 20-s to 31-s.
7. W u , G.-D., and Richardson, R. W. 1 989.
The dynamic response of self-regulation of the
welding arc. Recent Trends in Welding Sci-
ence and Technology, pp. 9 2 9 - 9 3 1 , ASM In-
ternational, Materials Park, Ohio.
8. Kannatey-Asibu, E., Jr. 1987. Analysis of
the G M A W process for microprocessor con-
trol of arc length. Journal of Engineering for In-
0 Amplitude = 7.5% of the mean
* Amplitude = 10.0% of the mean
< al 0.0Q
• ®
s
« e
-0.05
-^ -0.10 - •° -0.10
-0.15
-„
0.0 8 X o
a
"2 "0.5
8 0
* -1.0
- •
Fig. 10 — The coefficients in the denominator Fig. 11 — The coefficients in the denominator
of parametric fits to the model transfer func- of parametric fits to the model transfer func-
tion tion
, _t A2K(T„)(Tm-Tc) s _ l a(Tm)
as a function of
, as a lunction W vz
ir(Tm)
JQvz
w = o\T„,
-
<*(ry
dustry, Vol. 109, pp. 1 72-1 76. ture Solid Materials, 1, pp. 7 - 5 8 1 , MacMillan
9. Leigh, J. R. 1983. Essentials of Nonlin- Co., New York, N.Y.
ear Control Theory, Topics in Control, pp. 13. Touloukian, Y. S., Powell, R. W., Ho,
10-22, IEEE. C. Y , and Nicolaou, M. C. 1973. Thermal dif-
10. Crank, ). 1984, Free and Moving fusivity. Thermophysical Properties of High
Boundary Problems, Oxford University Press, Temperature Solid Materials, 10, pp. 2 - 8 2 ,
Oxford, England. IFI/Plenum, N.Y.
11. Kim, Y.-S. 1982. Metal Transfer in Gas 14. Touloukian, Y. S., and Buyco, E. H.
Metal Arc Welding, Ph.D. Thesis, Massachu- 1970. Specific Heat. Thermophysical proper-
setts Institute of Technology. ties of high temperature solid materials, 4, pp.
12. Touloukian, Y. S. 1967 The elements. 1-102, IFI/Plenum, N.Y.
Thermophysical Properties of High Tempera- 15. Touloukian, Y. S„ Powell, R. W., Ho,
C. Y., and Klemens, P. G. 1970. Thermal con-
ductivity. Thermophysical Properties of High
Temperature Solid Materials, 1, pp. 9-1 09,
0 Amplitude = 7.5% of the rrean IFI/Plenum, N.Y.
* Amplitude = 10.0% of the
* '"
,a
> 0.00
e u 1 6. Lin, P. L., and Wu, Y. C. 1982. Identifi-
cation of multi-input multi-output linear sys-
-0.05 tems from frequency response data. Journal of
Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Con-
trol, Vol. 104, pp. 5 8 - 6 4 .
17. Heald, P. R., Madigan, R. B., Siewert,
-0.15
a T. A., and Liu, S. 1991. Droplet transfer modes
1
for a MIL 100S-1 G M A W electrode. NISTIR
3976, Gaithersburg, M d . , NIST.
1 8. Press, W. H., Flannery, B. P., Teukolsky,
o O 0.0 0 0 S. A., and Vetterling, W. T. 1988. Numerical
• •- ° Recipes in C, pp. 6 0 1 - 6 2 1 , Cambridge Uni-
2 -0-5
versity Press, Cambridge, England.
" 19. Forsythe, G. E., and Wasow, W. R.
-»•«

1960. Finite-Difference Methods for Partial

-1.5 - -1.5 " Differential Equations, pp. 6 8 - 7 1 , John Wiley
and Sons, New York, N.Y.
5j 15C 250 350 450 0 15C 250 350

Nomenclature

Fig. 12 — The coefficients in the numerator of Fig. 13 — The coefficients in the numerator of a A m p l i t u d e of
parametric fits to the model transfer function parametric fits to the model transfer function response in s
a1,a2,b0,bi Coefficients in fit of
s _ t A2K(Tm)(Tm-Tc) 5 a[Tm _
, as a function •, as a function of transfer f u n c t i o n s
1) I' ~W~ v2 '
Wm) a„;, a w A m p l i t u d e of sinusoidal e x c i -
ofW = w=-^y t a t i o n in qj or W .
or I C a[Tm

246-s I OCTOBER 1994

A Cross-sectional area
of the e l e c t r o d e u =
c(T) Specific heat T-Tr a Um
1
Dimensionless temperature Dimensionless
C(a) = v = excitation frequency

i/a(u[rm-rc]+rc) u
Reciprocal of JK(C[Tm-Tc] + Tc)d^ Appendix
thermal diffusivity
Transformed A s s u m i n g t h a t t h e d r o p has a u n i f o r m
Electron charge temperature temperature distribution, and neglecting
v
m V at u = 1 (melting) other losses (radiation), t h e rate of heat
W i r e feed speed transfer to the d r o p c a n be w r i t t e n (Ref.
Va A n o d e fall 11)
y +1 Apparent condensation
V, -Qm+(l-y)VcJ +
2 voltage
K{rm)r{Tm){Tm-T( V o l u m e of the d r o p
jrdJ2DdV-^(cpVD(TD-Tm)) =0
M u l t i p l y i n g factor
v
used for c o n v e n i e n c e " (A1)
Kt) W e l d i n g current W(t) = where
JD C u r r e n t density
in t h e d r o p 3 kT„
vc = <t>+vA +
k a{Tm) 2 e
B o l t z m a n n ' s constant Peclet N u m b e r (A2)
K(T) Thermal conductivity x = Z/£0 Dimensionless If the rate of d r o p l e t f o r m a t i o n is as-
Electrode extension coordinate s u m e d to be steady-state a n d the average
-Fig. 1 Z Spatial c o o r d i n a t e d r o p l e t g e o m e t r y is u s e d , K i m s h o w e d
Latent heat -Fig. 1 (Ref. 1 1 , p. 155) that

Subscripts A Vj g, tD
^•(o=
l\t)tlr{Tm 0 Refers to the v a r i a b l e
Vc{i-r)i
A2K(l att = 0 2
Dimensionless, volu- (A3)
ss Refers to the v a r i a b l e
m e t r i c , heat g e n e r a t i o n For a d r o p l e t radius o n the order of the
at t h e steady-state s o l u t i o n
Rate of heat transfer e l e c t r o d e d i a m e t e r (spray transfer), t h e
QA(D
to s o l i d e l e c t r o d e Greek Joule h e a t i n g is several orders of m a g n i -
from condensing t u d e less t h a n the c o n t r i b u t i o n f r o m e l e c -
e l e c t r o n s (z = £) a(T) Thermal diffusivity = pc t r o n c o n d e n s a t i o n . Q m is f i n a l l y a p p r o x -
Rate of heat transfer Fraction of electrons i m a t e d by
QmO") T
to s o l i d e l e c t r o d e that c o n d e n s e o n the
f r o m t h e m e l t (z = i) solid e l e c t r o d e (0 < y < 1 )
r(T) Resistivity of Qr 2
electrode (A4)
N o t e that the m o d e l w i l l be most ef-
fective for spray transfer. Equation 3 c a n
r Resistivity of t h e S e c o n d Kutateladze n o w be w r i t t e n as
D
l i q u i d in the d r o p number

-K(T)^ + KL(t)[ 111

i"[y-rc]+Tc) 5: s(t)
2
dl
Dimensionless pm
Transformed c o o r d i n a t e
D e n s i t y of e l e c t r o d e
pirn m dt ) (A5)
resistivity Equation 1 c a n be m a d e d i m e n s i o n -
p' D e n s i t y of t h e l i q u i d
s(t) t(t)Ao Dimensionless less in t h e f o r m o f
electrode extension in the d r o p
t Time
d2v(u)
+ q, T r u
Period of d r o p l e t d e - dx2 ""
tachment
Temperature of e l e c t r o d e ; s u b -
4 Fourier n u m b e r 1 ; l
' dx dr
scripts c a n d m refer to (A6)
T at z = 0 ( c o n t a c t tip) a n d a Laplace v a r i a b l e w i t h dimensionless boundary conditions
z = £ ( m e l t i n g ) . Subscripts e 0 Work function of
a n d D refer to the t e m p e r a t u r e electrode
of the c o n d e n s i n g electrons a n d Phase of the response
the t e m p e r a t u r e of the d r o p . in s

W F I D I N C R F S F A R C H SI JPPI F M F M T I 9 d 7 - c
 T h e steady-state Equations A 9 to A11 c u r r e n t I, the e l e c t r o d e feed speed v z , a n d
v{x=0,t) = 0, are treated like an eigen v a l u e p r o b l e m qj(W).
(Ref. 18) w i t h Equation A 9 r e w r i t t e n as
v x = slT , r =v„ T h e transient p r o b l e m , Equations A 6
t w o first o r d e r e q u a t i o n s by letting
to A 8 , is s o l v e d by using t h e c o o r d i n a t e
transformation
dx +N(*)) dv
vr dx
X\ W ( T ) y2=v ^=W)
(A7) Yi = Oj (A16)
(A12)
a n d d i m e n s i o n l e s s initial c o n d i t i o n s to fix the moving boundary according to
w h i c h gives
(Ref. 10). The resulting nonlinear partial
S ( T = 0 ) = 1,
dy, differential equation is solved by using
y3r*(u) + C(u)WH
V(X,T = o)= vnU(x) dx central differences in t, for unequally
1
' (A8)
dy2 spaced nodes (Ref. 19). The nodes are
T h e g o v e r n i n g e q u a t i o n for steady- dx spaced in a geometric progression with
state c a n be by f o u n d by setting the t i m e
dy3 more nodes near the % = 1 boundary. A
derivatives in Equations A 6 to A 8 to z e r o =0
dx backward differentiation method for stiff
a n d c h a n g i n g t h e partial derivatives w i t h (A13)
equations is used to solve the resulting set
respect to x to o r d i n a r y d e r i v a t i v e s : The boundary conditions for Equation
of ordinary differential equations.
A13 are
To calculate v, K(T) is first smoothed
-±± + qjr*{u)- y,(0) = 0 from room temperature to the melting
dx point using a moving average to avoid
dv(u) Yl^)=vm step changes in K(T) when the material
C(u)W
dx 1 changes from one solid phase to another;
(A9) -y^=-{Fy3)2+XW ( A U ) a piecewise cubic spline is then fit to the
H e r e t h e b o u n d a r y is f i x e d at s 1, giv-
A r e l a x a t i o n m e t h o d is used to solve for tabulated K(T) and integrated. Tabulated
ing the b o u n d a r y c o n d i t i o n s
y-i, y 2 , a n d y 3 (Ref. 18). T h e steady-state values of oc(T) and r(T) are then written as
= 0, m o d e l predicts q. g i v e n W ,
functions of v, smoothed and fitted with
:1) =
piecewise cubic splines.
(A10)
T h e p r o b l e m is subject to the a u x i l i a r y Q7 = q,(ty) = q , ( ^
c o n d i t i o n t h a t e n o u g h e n e r g y m u s t be
s u p p l i e d at x = 1 that t h e e l e c t r o d e u n - T h e steady-state EE, is g i v e n f r o m
dergoes a phase c h a n g e :

dv_ A2K(Tm)(Tm-Tr
' dx +H |2 =XW
(AID
Equation A11 determines the qj (the , | ^ l
welding current) for which the solutions (A15)
of Equations A9 and A10 are valid. given the material constants, the welding

248-s I JUNE 1994