Fast Prediction for Resistance Spot Welding Deformation Using Inherent Strain Method and Nugget Model

In a car body, there exist thousands of resistance spot welds, which may induce large deformation during the manufacturing process. Therefore, it is expected that automotive industries will develop a method and a computing system for the fast and simple prediction of its deformation. Although the inherent strain method has been used for the fast prediction of arc welding deformation, it has not been applied to resistance spot welding so far. Additionally, the electrical-thermal-mechanical coupling analysis for the deformation induced by resistance spot welding is complicated and much more time-consuming. Therefore, in this study, a nugget model of the resistance spot weld has been developed, and the inherent strain method is extended for use in the fast prediction of resistance spot welding deformation. In addition, the deformation of a vehicle part with 23 resistance spot welds was efficiently predicted within around 90 min using the inherent strain method, displaying good accuracy compared with the measurement.

Influence of Deposition Patterns on Distortion of H13 Steel by Wire-Arc Additive Manufacturing

Wire-arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) has been considered as one of the potential additive-manufacturing technologies to fabricate large components. However, its industrial application is still limited by the existence of stress and distortion. During the process of WAAM, the scanning pattern has an important influence on the temperature field, distortion and final quality of the part. Four kinds of deposition patterns, including sequence, symmetry, in–out and out–in, were designed to deposit H13 steel in this study. An in situ measurement system was set up to record the temperature history and the progress of accumulated distortion of the parts during deposition. An S value was proposed to evaluate the distortion of the substrate. It was shown that the distortion of the part deposited by sequence was significantly larger than those of other parts. The distortion deposited by the out–in pattern decreased by 68.6% compared with sequence. The inherent strain method and strain parameter were introduced to expose the mechanism of distortion reduction caused by pattern variation.

Research on Deformation Prediction Method of Laser Melting Deposited Large-Sized Parts Based on Inherent Strain Method

In the process of metal parts fabricated by Laser Melting Deposition (LMD), a high temperature gradient will generate due to the instantaneous high laser energy input, which will cause residual stress in the formed part of metal parts, the residual stress will result in defects like warping deformation or even cracking. In this paper, a finite element method based on inherent strain method is proposed to predict the deformation of metal parts fabricated by LMD. Firstly, combing with the birth and death element technology, a local model is established to simulate the layer-by-layer deposition in the LMD forming process, and the values of inherent strain is obtained. Secondly, the obtained inherent strain values is applied to large-sized part layer by layer, and the final deformation of large-sized part is calculated. Based on the proposed method, the efficiency of deformation prediction of large-sized metal parts fabricated by LMD could be effectively improved.