• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.35 no.10
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• pp.1179-1185
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• 2011

Cold and hot-rolled carbon steel sheets are commonly used in railroad cars or commercial vehicles such as the automobile. The sheets used in these applications are mainly fabricated by spot welding, which is a type of electric resistance welding. However, the fatigue strength of a spot-welded joint is lower than that of the base metal because of high stress concentration at the nugget edge of the spot-welded part. In particular, the fatigue strength of the joint is influenced by not only geometrical and mechanical factors but also the welding conditions for the spot-welded joint. Therefore, there is a need for establishing a reasonable criterion for a long-life design for spot-welded structures. In this thesis, ${\Delta}P-N_f$ relation curves have been used to determine a long-life fatigue-design criterion for thin-sheet structures. However, as these curves vary under the influence of welding conditions, mechanical conditions, geometrical factors, etc. It is very difficult to systematically determine a fatigue-design criterion on the basis of these curves. Therefore, in order to eliminate such problems, the welding residual stresses generated during welding and the stress distributions around the weld generated by external forces were numerically and experimentally analyzed on the basis of the results, reassessed fatigue strength of gas welded joints.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.100-110
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• 1998

In this paper, the laser weldability of thin gage steels for automobile application is discussed. Welding was carried out with a high power carbon dioxide laser system, and the laser energy was concentrated through a plano-convex lens. Test results showed that the joint gap in the butt welding proved to be one of the critical conditions for an acceptable weld. In the case where the ratio of the gap clearance to the material thickness was slightly bigger than optimal value, the weld strength was reduced showing weld metal fracture. It was possible to obtained a weld penetration ratio of 0.91 when the vertical offset ratio was controlled to be 0.4 or smaller. Results also demonstrated that the weld strength of the lap joint was influenced by travel speed. At the travel speeds lower than 37 mm/s, the weld strength indicated higher value than that of class A recommendation strength of a resistance spot weld based on the KS code. It was clear that the complicated effect of specimen alignment should be considered so as to make a sound weld with high integrity when the laser process was applied to the long weld line.

• International Journal of Automotive Technology
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.55-59
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• 2004

Spot welding is a very important and useful technology in fabrication of thin sheet structures such as the parts in an automobile. However, because the fatigue strength of the spot welding point is considerably lower than that of the base metal due to stress concentration at the nugget edge, the nugget size must be estimated to evaluate a reasonable fatigue strength at a spot welded lap joint. So far, many investigators have experimentally studied the estimation of fatigue strengths of various spot weldments by using a destructive method. However, these destructive methods poses problems so testing of weldments by these methods are difficult. Furthermore, these methods cannot be applied to a real product, and are time and cost consuming, as well. Therefore, there has been a strong, continual demand for the development of a nondestructive method for estimating nugget size. In this study, the effective nugget size in spot weldments have been analyzed by using thermoelastic stress analysis adopting infrared thermography. Using the results of the temperature distribution obtained by analysis of the infared stress due to adiabatic heat expansion under sinusoidal wave stresses, the effective nugget size in spot welded specimens were estimated. To examine the evaluated effective nugget size in spot weldments, it was compared with the results of microstructure observation from a 5％ Nital etching test.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.14-17
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• 2015

Cleaning effect is well known mechanism of oxide layer removal in DCEP polarity. It is also known that DCEN has higher heat input efficiency than DCEP in GTAW process. Based on these two renowned arc theories, conventional variable polarity arc for aluminum welding was set up to have minimum DCEP and maximum DCEN duty ratio to achieve the highest heat input efficiency and weldability increase. However, recent several variable polarity GTA research papers reported unexpected result of proportional relationship between DCEP duty ratio and heat input. The authors also observed the same result then suggested combination of tunneling effect and random walk of cathode spot to fill up the gap between experiment and conventional arc theory. In this research, suggested combinational work of tunneling effect and rapid cathode spot changing is applied to another unexpected phenomena of variable polarity aluminum arc welding. From previous research, it is reported that wider oxide removal range, narrower bead width and shallower penetration depth are observed in thin oxide layered aluminum compared to the case of thick oxide. This result was reported for the first time and it was hard to explain the reason at that time therefore the inference by the authors was hardly acceptable. However, the suggested combinational theory successfully explains the result of the previous report in logical way.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.49-56
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• 1997

Effect of process parameters on the quality of condenser discharge weld for coated sheet steels was discussed. The welding specimens were coated with pure Zn of 20/20 g/m2 in the production line. Direct measurements of welding parameters such as the discharge current, the pressures and the voltage drop across the electrodes were carried out with welding process monitoring system. High speed camera was also utilized to analyze the weld formation process. Test results indicated that the relation between weld strength and applied energy was stabilized at the acceptable welding heat input range. It was thought that the acceptable welding heat input should be redefined based on the monitored data because the calculated value of the welding heat input could hardly be utilized if the discharge condition was changed. Mechanical test results and high speed photographs showed that expulsion deteriorated the weld quality and the strength at the same time especially when the size of the spatter was large enough to carry the molten metal, which should form the nugget, out of the welding spot. Results also demonstrated that the discharge current should be applied at the appropriate time during the process because sufficient nugget was not produced if the time was deviated from the optimum range.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.19 no.11
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• pp.102-108
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• 2020

The demand for lightweight materials and high-strength steel has rapidly increased to help reduce the weight of a vehicle body; it improves the fuel efficiency of automobiles and provides passenger safety. Additionally, as the material becomes thinner, the demand for its resistance against corrosion becomes higher. Hence, the application of the surface-treated steel sheet has surged rapidly. In this study, a weld bonding experiment using a delta spot welding machine is performed on a thin sheet of a different material (Al6061-T6/GA440). The thickness of the material was kept at 1 mm to reduce the weight of the automobile body parts. Additionally, the purpose of this study is to control the heat input by applying the welding conditions of a multi-stage pressure pattern to improve corrosion resistance shear strength. The analysis of nugget diameter measurement, shear tensile test, and salt spray test was performed to achieve the aim.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.61-65
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• 2014

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the applicability of the element stress to establish S-N design curve for the welded lap joint with thin plates below 2mm thickness. In order to do it, the extensive fatigue tests of the welded lap joints with INVAR alloy were performed. With the results, the deign S-N curves for the lap-weld were established by using the reference stresses such as the nominal stress range at the weld throat area, hot spot stress range and element stress range, and compared with regard to the standard deviation. The standard deviation of S-N curves with element stress range was less than that of S-N curves with other reference stresses. In addition, FEA results show the amount of the element stress is less sensitive to mesh size. Based on the results, it can be concluded that the element stress is to be used as the reference stress for the design S-N curves of the welded lap joint.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.15 no.8
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• pp.102-108
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• 1998

본 논문에서는 Nd-YAG 레이저 용접 프로세스를 이용하여 두께가 다른 STS304스테인레스 박강판을 대상으로한 점용접에 관한 연구로서, 레이저 용접은 미소부위에 효율적인 접합가공이 가능한 공정으로 비접촉식 가열원을 이용하기 때문에 접합공정 중 기계적 변형이 없고, 레이저 빔을 국부가열원으로 하여 매우 좁은 부분에 제한적으로 열을 가할 수 있어서 강한 금속적 결합이 요구되는 소형부품의 접합에 이용될 수 있다. 뿐만 아니라 공정 변수들을 변화시켜 실제 접합부에 들어 가는 입열량을 쉽게 제어할 수 있다는 등 많은 장점을 가지고 있다. 본 연구에서는 1mm이하의 스테인레스 박판에 대한 레이저 점용접을 FDM과 신경회로망을 이용하여 해석하고 용접부의 너겟 크기, 용접부 깊이 등의 형상을 예측하였다. 또한 레이저 점용접에 있어서의 주요 변수인 펄스 에너지, 펄스 타임, 박판의 두께, 두 판사이의 간극크기 등득 변화시켜 실험하고 수치해석을 검증하기 위하여 여러 가지 강에 대한 레이저 점용접 실험을 수행하였다. 또한 수치해석 시뮬레이션을 위하여 윈도우 프로그래밍을 개발하였다.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.16-23
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• 2019

Steels for automotive fuel tank require unique properties such as corrosion resistance for fuel, welding for joining, forming for press, and painting for exterior. Recently, automakers have been requiring excellent seam weldable steels to enhance manufacturing productivity of fuel tank. Thus, POSCO developed a new type of functional steels coated with nano-composite thin layer on Zn-Ni plating steels. The nano-composite coating solution was prepared by mechanical fine dispersion of solutions consisting of polymeric resin and nano-composite materials in aqueous media. The composite solution was coated on the plating steel surface by using roll coater and cured through induction furnace. These new developed plating steels were evaluated for quality performances such as seam and spot weldability, press formability, and corrosion resistance. These new functional steels coated with nano-composite layer exhibited excellent seam weldability and press formability. Detailed discussion of coating solution and experimental results suggest that nano-sized composite dispersion as coating layer plays a key role in enhancing the quality performance.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.302-309
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• 2024

The purpose of this study was to elucidate effects of a thin (tens to hundreds of nanometers) Ni-flash coating layer on hydrogen embrittlement (HE) and liquid metal embrittlement (LME) in ultra-high-strength electrogalvanized steel with a tensile strength of more than 1 GPa. Various experimental and analytical methods, including thermal desorption spectroscopy, slow strain rate testing, resistance spot welding, X-ray diffraction, and metallographic observation, were employed. Results showed that an increase in Ni target amount for flash coating resulted in a decrease in diffusible hydrogen content during electrogalvanizing, resulting in a significant decrease in HE sensitivity. Moreover, a Ni target amount of more than 1000 mg/m² drastically reduced the occurring frequency and average depth of LME. This reduction could be primarily attributed to formation of Zn-Ni intermetallic phases during the welding process that could inhibit liquefaction of intermetallic phases in the heat-affected zone. This study provides a desirable Ni target amount for Ni-flash coating on ultra-high-strength steels conducted in a continuous galvanizing line or a high-speed batch line to achieve high resistance to both HE and LME.