Friction Stir Welding of three dissimilar aluminium alloy used in aeronautics industry

Abstract

Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is an innovative solid-state joining process. This process was, in first time, develop to join the similar aluminum plates but now the technology can be used to weld a large area of materials similar or dissimilar. Taking these into account FSW process, for dissimilar materials are increasingly required, more than traditional arc welding, in industrial environment. More than that FSW is used in aeronautics industry because of very good result and very good weldability between aluminum alloy used at building of airplanes, where the body of airplane are 20% aluminum alloy and this percent can be increaser in future. In this paper is presented an experimental study which includes welding three dissimilar aluminum alloy, with different properties, used in aeronautics industry, this materials are: AA 2024, AA6061 and AA7075. After welding with different parameters, the welding join and welding process will be analyzed considering process temperature, process vertical force, and roughnessof welding seams, visual aspect and microhardness.