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Penetration and Bead Shape of SUS304 Stainless Steel on Double-Side Flux Cored Arc Welding Joint
Narin Intawong and Bovornchok Poopat Plastic and Composites Joining Technology Center King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi, Bangkok 10400 Phone 0-2470-9678, Fax. 0-2470-9681, E-Mail: narin_45@yahoo.com

Abstract This research was a study of joint interface penetration and bead shape by flux cored arc welding on SUS304 austenitic stainless steel that welded with double-side technique. The traditional flux cored arc welding machine was used with two welding torches, leading torch and following torch that were installed at opposite side. Torches are set for work angle by 80 and travel angle by 15. Specimen was installed at movable tractor that set of 0.6 cm/sec welding speed. Specimens were 6 mm thickness of SUS304 austenitic stainless steel, square butt joint were prepared with 0.4-0.8 m of roughness at the joint interface. After that, the specimens were transverse cut at weld for macro-structure test. The macro-structure examination was used for measuring the penetration and bead shape of specimens. Result of experiment showed that fully penetration and bead shape can be achieved.

requirement, and the bead shape was impacting to work serviceability. So, the parameters of welding had to optimize those requirements as described above.

2. Experimental procedures 2.1 Equipment setup Specimens was 6- mm thick SUS304 that cut to 300 mm length and 200 mm with, machined at the weld interface to 0.4-0.8 m roughness by shaping machine and tack welded together. Tacked specimen was installed on tractor that set the welding speed of 0.6 cm/sec. The Fronius T.I.M.E. Synergic and Fronius Transpulse Synergic welding machines were used; both welding torches of machines are set to 10 of work angle and 75 of travel angle. Offset distance between electrode wires was set as variable. Electrode wires were FCAW 308L T1.1 according to AWS standard. The set of experimental was shown in fig 1.

1. Introduction SUS304 is one of industrial material that has many advantages of property, such as corrosion resistance and good mechanical properties compared with normal plain carbon steel. The SUS304 is suitable for using in chemical, petrochemical, food, medical, structural

A B C

industries, etc. However, welding of SUS304 provides many problems, such as risk of contamination, less of production rate, and low penetration. The double-side flux cored arc welding (DS-FCAW) technique is developed for solving these problems. DS-FCAW decreased the risk of contamination by fully contact of joint interface that contaminate was not be grasped and it reduced the time of fabrication by welding on both side at one time. The penetration was increased from DS-FCAW by heating energy optimization of both welding torches. Fully penetration square butt welding joint was first From Fig 1: A is the tacked welding specimen. B is the Fronius T.I.M.E. Synergic torch. C is the Fronius Transpulse Synergic torch. D is the movable welding tractor. Fig. 1: Double Side FCAW setup set

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3 Penetration Distance (mm)

2.2 Variable setup Variables of this experiment were set for preferring the fully penetration. They can be parted to 2 types of variable: constant variables and vary variables. Table 1 showed constant variables while the vary variables were shown as step by step due to experimental sequences.

2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0 0

Lead Follow

10

Offset Distance (mm)

Table 1: Constant variables of the experimental

Constant Variables CO2 Gas Flow Work Angle Travel Angle Wire Extension Interface Roughness Value 15 80 15 16 0.4-0.8 Unit

Fig. 2: Penetration as function of offset distance: Current lead/follow is 190/210 amp.

3 Lead Penetration Distance (mm) 2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0 0 2 4 6 8 10 Offset Distance (mm)

l/min degree degree mm m

Follow

The specimens are installed to experimental equipments and welded with following experimental steps for acquiring the values of parameters that achieved welding requirements. After each step, the welded specimens are cut and checked penetration and bead shape by macro structure examination.

Fig. 3: Penetration as function of offset distance: Current lead/follow is 210/190 amp.

3.2 Variables optimization The offset distance affected penetration of welding joint, best offset distance was achieved highest heat that

3. Experimental sequences and results 3.1 Welding current and offset distance features Variables of first step were shown in table 2, welding currents and offset distances were varied for investigating

conducted from leading side. Too high or too low offset distance was caused of non-fully penetration. Fig 4 showed the effect of offset distance.
3 2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0

Penetration Distance (mm)

features of both variables.

Vary Variables Welding Current (Lead/Follow) Offset Distance Welding Speed Value 190/210, 210/190 0, 5,10 0.8
st

Lead Follow

Unit Ampere mm cm/sec

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

Offset Distance between Leading and Following Electrodes (mm)

Table 2: Vary variables of the 1 step experimental Penetration of 1st step experimental was shown in Fig 2 and 3. Fig 2 was result of lead/follow current as 190/210 amp while Fig 3 was 210/190 amp . The results showed that higher follow current makes more penetration, especially on following torch side. Offset distances affected on penetration of following side, the penetration was increased as shown in Fig 2.

Fig. 4: Optimization of offset distance

As Fig 4, deepest penetration was tunnel at 16 mm offset distance because heat energy from leading side was transferred to other side at 16 mm distance behind the lead electrode. After that, the welding current was increased for achieving deepest penetration. However, the levels of

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current had to set higher current. Variables that used on this step was shown in Table 3. Table 3: Vary variables for optimization
Vary Variables Value 200/220, Welding Current (Lead/Follow) 210/230, 220/240, 240/240, 240/250 Offset Distance Welding Speed 162 0.8 Run# 1 2 3 4 5 mm cm/sec Ampere Unit

Fig. 7: Measured distance of examination Results of bead shape macro-structure examination were shown in Table 4.

Table 4: Bead shape of tested specimens

3

2.5 Penetration Distance (mm)

Lead Weld(mm) No C+D 1

Lead Follow

Follow Weld(mm) C+D B

Criteria Acceptant Lead Weld Non Accept Follow Weld Non Accept Non Accept Non Accept Non Accept Accept Non Accept

1.5 1

Burn Through 6.33 6.67 6.95 6.59 6.56 7.20 7.88 7.98 7.58 7.33 8.84 9.13 9.32 9.08 9.38 8.21 9.02 9.23 9.28 9.32

2 3 4

Accept Accept Accept Accept Accept

0.5

0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 Experimental Run Sequence

5 6

Fig. 5: Effect of welding current characteristics

The result showed that the deepest penetration occurred on run sequence no. 4 (240/240 amp). However, the fully penetration was not achieved. So, welding speed was decreased to 0.6 cm/sec for increasing heating energy. Then, the deepest penetration condition was used to weld again with reduce the welding speed. The new condition was run on 6 specimens for confirming the results. Macro-structure examination tested for penetration and bead shape. The result of joint penetration was shown in Fig 6.
Penetration Distance (mm) 6 Lead 5 3 4 3 2 3 1 0 1 2 3 4 Repeat Number 5 6 2.87 2.75 2.82 3 6 2.95 2.93 2.91 3 W/O fusion Follow

4. Discussion and conclusion Fig 6, 7 and table 4 showed that weld bead dimension measurement that presented penetration and bead shape of weldment. It could be seen that specimen no. 2 and 6 were accepted one with both welding current by 240 amp and welding speed of 0.6 cm/sec that both could produce the penetration with suitable results while no. 5 was accepted with suitable weld bead shape. So, the DSFCAW could be achieved the fully penetration with suitable bead shape results. However, the parameters of welding had to carefully control for optimizing condition. 6. References 1. Chon, L.T. and Chin, M.T., 1993, Heat Flow in Fusion Welding, ASM Hand Book Volume 2 Welding Brazing and Soldering, T.W. Eagar, ASM International, New York, pp. 8-15. 2. Lancaster, J.F., 1986, The Physics of Welding, 2nd ed., Wheaton & Co. Ltd, London, pp. 32-39, 49-50, 54-55, 120, 228-269.

Fig. 6: Penetration result of optimized parameters

The bead shape results was measured with criteria of test that described in Fig 7, accepted bead shape must haven distance C+D that never over than distance B.

3. Zhang, Y.M., Zhang, S.B. and Jiang, M., 2002, Keyhole Double-Side Arc Welding Process,

Welding Journal, pp. 249-255.