Effect of Tool Tilt Angle on Aluminum 2014 Friction Stir Welds
Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is an emerging solid state welding process gaining more applicability in various industries due to better quality of the joint as it has no effect on the parent metal. This process utilises a non-consumable rotating tool to generate frictional hat between tool and abutting surface of work piece to accomplish the weld. Being a solid state joining process, friction stir welding process offers various advantages like low distortion, absence of melt related defects, high joint strength etc., as compared to other conventional fusion welding techniques. An attempt has been made to study the influence of tool tilt angle on Aluminium 2014-T6 welds. A study on FSW of AA2014 Aluminium alloy at varying tool tilt angle ranging from 0 to 3 degrees at an interval of 0.5° and keeping other process parameters constant are presented in this paper. Present work also examines the force and torque during FSW with respect to defect development. This is due to owing to process parameters variation which results in variation in heat generation. The force on the pin in the metal flow direction (which is also called X-axis force) was correlated with defect formation, high X-axis force is recommended for defect free welds.
