• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.29-29
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• 2009

On this research, laser welding technology for manufacturing automobile body is studied. Laser welding technology is one of the important technologies used in the manufacturing of lighter, safer automotive bodies at a high level of productivity; the leading automotive manufacturers have replaced spot welding with laser welding in the process of car body assembly. Korean auto manufacturers are developing and applying the laser welding technology using a high output power Nd:YAG laser and a 6-axes industrial robot. On the other hand, the robot-based remote laser welding system was equipped with a long focal laser scanner system in robotic end effect. Laser system, robot system, and scanner system are used for realizing the high speed laser welding system. The remote laser welding system and industrial robotic system are used to consist of robot-based remote laser welding system. The robot-based remote laser welding system is flexible and able to improve laser welding speed compared with traditional welding as spot welding and laser welding. The robot-based remote laser systems used in this study were Trumpf's 4kW Nd:YAG laser (HL4006D) and IPG's 1.6kW Fiber laser (YLR-1600), while the robot systems were of ABB's IRB6400R (payload:120kg) and Hyundai Heavy Industry's HX130-02 (payload:130kg). In addition, a study of quality evaluation and monitoring technology for the remote laser welding was conducted. The welding joints of steel plate and steel plate coated with zinc were butt and lapped joints. The quality testing of the laser welding was conducted by observing the shape of the beads on the plate and the cross-section of the welded parts, analyzing the results of mechanical tension test, and monitoring the plasma intensity and temperature by using UV and IR detectors. Over the past years, Trumf's 4kW Nd:YAG laser and ABB's IRB6400R robot system was used. Nowadays, the new laser source, robot and laser scanner system are used to increase the processing speed and to improve the efficiency of processes. This paper proposes the robot-based remote laser welding system as a means of resolving the limited welding speed and accuracy of conventional laser welding systems.

• International Journal of Korean Welding Society
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.2-7
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• 2003

Laser welding application for car body manufacturing has many advantages in the stiffness and the lightness of vehicle, the productivity of assembly line, and the degree of freedom in design. This presentation will express the innovation of car body manufacturing including parameter optimization, process modeling, and system integration. In this application the investment for systems was cut down dramatically by real time switching over the laser path between two welding stations. Points of technical discussion are as follows; optimization of parameters such as laser power, robot speed and trajectory, compact and useful design of jig & fixture to assure welding quality for 3 sheet-layer zinc-coated steel, system integration between 4㎾ Nd:YAG laser device and the other systems, on-line real time welding quality monitoring system, perfect safety standards for high power laser, minimization of consumption costs such as arc lamp, protective glass for optic, etc. This application was successfully launched mass production line in 2001. The laser-welded line of side panel consists of 122 stitches totally. And the length is about 2.4m.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.64-70
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• 2007

Recently, several models to control weld quality, productivity and weld properties in arc welding process have been developed and applied. Also, the applied model to make effective use of the robotic GMA(Gas Metal Arc) welding process should be given a high degree of confidence in predicting the bead dimensions to accomplish the desired mechanical properties of the weldment. In this study, a development of the on-line learning neural network models that investigate interrelationships between welding parameters and bead width as well as apply for the on-line quality control system for the robotic GMA welding process has been carried out. The developed models showed an excellent predicted results comparing with the predicted ability using off-line learning neural network. Also, the system will extend to other welding process and the rule-based expert system which can be incorporated with integration of an optimized system for the robotic welding system.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.13 no.2 s.32
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• pp.74-82
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• 1999

Nowadays, the crank shaft motor vehicle has become essential as the important component. The machining precision was asked for manufacturing the shaft. They could be unstable in the quality by the conventional are welding. Both in-process quailty control and high reliability of the weld are the major concerns in applying friction wlding to the economical and qualified mass-production. No reliable nondestructive monitoring method is avaliable at present to determine the real-time evaluation of automatic production quality control for bar-to-bar friction welding of the crank shaft of O.D 24mm for motor vehicle. This paper, so that, presents the experimental examinations and statistical quantitative analysis of the correlation between the cumulative counts of acoustic emission(AE) during plastic deformation periods of the welding and the tensile strength and other properties of the bar-to-bar welded joints of O.D. 24mm shaft as well as the various welding variables, as a new approach which attempts finally to develop real-time quality monitoring system for friction welding, resulting in practical possiblility of real-time quality control more than 100% joint efficiency showing good weld with no micro structural defects.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.44-50
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• 2012

• 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.

• Laser Solutions
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.21-30
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• 2002

In automotive industry, the studies about light weight vehicle and improving the productivity have been accomplished. For that, TRIP steel was developed and research for the laser welding process have been performed. In this study, the monitoring system using photodiode was developed for laser welding process of TRIP steel. With measuring light, neural network model for estimating bead width and tensile strength was made and weld quality classification algorithm was formulated with fuzzy inference method.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.10 no.7
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• pp.1326-1331
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• 2006

Weld root gap is a important fact of a falling-off weld quality in various kind of weld defect. The welding quality can be controlled by monitoring important parameters, such as, the Arc voltage, welding current and welding speed during the welding process. Welding systems use either a vision sensor or an Arc sensor, both of which are unable to control these parameters directly. Therefore, it is difficult to obtain necessary bead geometry without automatically controlling the welding parameters through the sensors. In this paper we propose a novel approach using neural networks for detecting and monitoring of weld root gap and bead shape. Through experiments we demonstrate that the proposed system can be used for real welding processes. The results demonstrate that the system can efficiently estimate the weld bead shape and detect the welding defects.

• International Journal of Automotive Technology
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.209-216
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• 2006

A study has been conducted for an optimal processing and an apparatus for manufacturing a laser welded tube for one-body formed bumper beam. The tube dimensions used in calculation were the thickness of 1.4 mm, the diameter of 105.4 mm and the length of 2000 mm. The tube was formed of a cold rolled high strength steel plate(tensile strength of 600 MPa). The two-roll bending method was the optimal tube forming process in comparison with the UO-bending method, the bending method on the press brake, the multi-step continuous roll-forming method and the 3-roll bending method. Monitoring of the welding quality was conducted and the seam tracking along the butt-joint lengthwise to the tube axis was also examined. The longitudinal butt-joint was welded by using a $CO_2$ laser welding machine equipped with a seam tracker and a plasma sensor. The $CO_2$ laser tube welding machine could be used for precise seam tracking and real-time monitoring of the welding quality. As a result, the developed laser welded tube could be used for a one-body formed automobile bumper beam.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.13 no.1 s.31
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• pp.88-93
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• 1999

This paper presents the experimental examinations and statistical quantitative analysis of the correlation between the cumulative counts of acoustic emission(AE) during plastic deformation periods of the welding and the tensile strength and other properties of the bar-to-bar welded joints of O.D. 16mm shaft(SM40C) as well as the various welding variables. And this is a new approach which attempts finally to develop real-time quality monitoring system for friction welding. The results lead to a practical possibility of real-time quality control more than 100% joint efficiency showing good weld with no micro structural defects.