A STUDY ON THERMAL ANALYSIS OF HORIZONTAL FILLET JOINTS BY CONSIDERING BEAD SHAPE IN GMA WELDING

In GMA(Gas Metal Arc)Welding, the weld size that is a locally melted area of a workpiece is one of the most important considerations in determining the strength of a welded structure. Variations in the weld power and the welding heat flux may affect the weld pool formation and ultimately the size of the weld. Therefore, an accurate prediction of the weld size requires a precise analysis of the weld thermal cycle. In this study, a model which can estimate the weld bead geometry and a method for thermal analysis, including the model, are suggested. In order to analyze the weld bead geometry, a mathematical model was developed with transformed coordinates to apply to the horizontal fillet joints. A heat flow analysis was performed with a two dimensional finite element model that was adopted for computing the base metal melting zone. The reliability of the proposed model and the thermal analysis was evaluated through experiments, and the results showed that the proposed model was very effective for predicting the weld bead shape and good correspondence in melting zone of the base metal.