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Arc characteristics and behaviour of metal transfer in pulsed current GMA welding of stainless steel
P.K. Ghosh a, , Lutz Dorn b , Shrirang Kulkarni a , F. Hofmann b
a b

Department of Metallurgical & Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee 247 667, India Fugetechnik und Bechichtungtechnik, Sekr. PTZ 6, Pascal strasse 8-9, TU Berlin, 10587 Berlin, Germany

a r t i c l e
Article history:

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
The variation in arc characteristics, stability in shielding of arc environment and behaviour of metal transfer with a change in pulse parameters have been studied by high speed videophotography during pulsed current gas metal arc (P-GMA) weld deposition using austenitic stainless steel ller wire. A comparative study of similar nature has also been carried out during gas metal arc (GMA) weld deposition in globular and spray transfer modes. The effect of pulse parameters has been studied by considering their hypothetically proposed summarized inuence dened by a dimensionless factor = [(Ib /Ip ) ftb ], mean current and arc voltage

Received 20 January 2008 Received in revised form 19 March 2008 Accepted 23 March 2008

Keywords: Austenitic stainless steel P-GMAW Welding parameters Arc characteristics Metal transfer Arc pressure Stability in shielding

and correlation between welding parameters and arc characteristics have been established. The arc characteristics studied by its root diameter, projected diameter, length and stiffness measured in terms of arc pressure and the behaviour of metal transfer noted by the droplet diameter and velocity of droplet at the time of detachment have been found to vary signicantly with the variation in . At a given the experimentally measured values of the and behaviour of metal transfer are found well in agreement to their corresponding theoretical values estimated through mathematical expressions reported earlier. The increase of arc prole especially at high arc voltage. 2008 Published by Elsevier B.V. the ratio of (Ib /Ip ) have been found to adversely affect the stability of shielding jacket and

1.

Introduction

The advent of pulsed current gas metal arc welding (P-GMAW) in critical applications of different ferrous (Dorling, 1992) and non-ferrous alloys (Ghosh and Dorn, 1994) to improve the weld characteristics over those observed in case of conventional continuous current gas metal arc welding (GMAW) (Lyttle, 1983) is fairly well established by several workers. But it is often pointed out that the quality of P-GMA weld very much depends upon arc characteristics (Ghosh et al., 1999) and behaviour of metal transfer (Randhawa et al., 2000) affecting the energy distribution in welding, as discussed in case of preparation of weld (Ghosh et al., 2000a) and bead on

plate weld deposition (Ghosh et al., 2000b), dictated by the pulse parameters. Generally two kinds of metal transfer, such as one droplet detachment per pulse and multiple droplets detachment per pulse are considered in P-GMAW process by keeping the pulse current at just above (Subramanium et al., 1999) and far higher than (Wu et al., 2005) the transition current respectively. The transition current is dened by the current shifting the behaviour of metal transfer (Wang et al., 2004) from the gravitational to spray mode. The process of one drop transfer per pulse with relatively low rate of metal transfer is popularly used in joining of thin section, whereas the multiple droplet transfer per pulse with proper control of arc characteristics and the behaviour of metal transfer

Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 1332 285699; fax: +91 1332 285243. E-mail address: prakgfmt@iitr.ernet.in (P.K. Ghosh). 0924-0136/$ see front matter 2008 Published by Elsevier B.V. doi:10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2008.03.049

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resulting in high deposition rate nds wide spread application of P-GMAW process in weld fabrication of different materials of varied section size. But, the control of arc characteristics and the behaviour of metal transfer by appropriate selection of pulse parameters in P-GMAW process (Ghosh et al., 2004) are quite critical due to simultaneous inuence of relatively large number of parameters on each other during welding (Ghosh et al., 2006). It involves the pulse parameters as mean current (Im ), pulse current (Ip ), base current (Ib ), pulse time (tp ), base time (tb ), pulse frequency (f) as well as arc voltage (V). However, the difculties in controlling the pulse parameters with respect to appropriate operation of P-GMAW process have been well addressed by considering a summarised inuence of pulse parameters dened by a hypothetical factor = [(Ib /Ip )ftb ] derived from the energy balance concept (Ghosh et al., 2007a) where, tb = [(1/f) tp ]. The difculties in proper selection of pulse parameters adversely affecting the weld quality get further compounded when the P-GMAW process is applied to heat-sensitive materials of low thermal conductivity and high coefcient of thermal expansion such as austenitic stainless steel (ASS). Due to its comparatively lower thermal conductivity and higher coefcient of thermal expansion than the structural steel, the

HAZ and weld of arc welded ASS becomes comparatively more prone to sensitization and development of considerable stresses respectively. Thus, during welding of ASS the pulse parameters should be more critically selected for efcient energy distribution in the arc leading to comparatively low heat built-up in weld pool. In this regard the knowledge of correlation of with the arc characteristics and behaviour of metal transfer may be very much useful for more precise and wide spread application of P-GMAW process in welding of ASS of improved weld quality. But, hardly any understanding has been reported so far in this area. In view of the above an effort has been made to study the effect of at various pulse parameters and arc voltage on the characteristics of arc and behaviour of metal transfer in P-GMAW process with the help of high speed video-grapy of arc environment during bead on plate weld deposition using 1.2 mm diameter SG-1.4316-2CrNi199 ASS ller wire in argon shielding. A similar study has also been carried out during GMAW process operated in globular and spray transfer modes of metal transfer to further analyse and compare the inuence of weld parameters on arc characteristics. The study provides a basic understanding to analyse the primary mechanisms of P-GMAW process dictated by the summarised inuence

Table 1 The pulse parameters giving stable arc at different Wire feed rate (mm/s)
158 158 142 125 158 158 92 142 125 100 125 100 125 92 125 100 125 92 92 142 125 125 125 125 125 92 92 108 92 92 100 100 100 100 100 0.07 0.11 0.18 0.19 0.20 0.24 0.27 0.09 0.17 0.17 0.21 0.23 0.07 0.08 0.10 0.15 0.15 0.18 0.25 0.06 0.06 0.12 0.21 0.23 0.26 0.05 0.11 0.16 0.20 0.26 0.08 0.12 0.19 0.23 0.27

Im (A)
255 258 244 246 248 256 248 212 214 215 220 210 200 206 205 205 204 207 200 211 199 208 209 201 207 181 182 189 179 188 160 161 165 173 175

Ip (A)
370 396 374 400 320 300 355 410 274 414 320 360 390 430 376 400 331 380 310 319 333 313 290 315 280 362 354 305 303 310 340 350 311 304 295

Ib (A)
55 95 108 124 106 102 157 59 84 108 109 122 45 58 57 88 80 93 109 32 32 58 104 123 124 40 57 76 85 110 40 64 90 106 121

(Ib /Ip )
0.15 0.24 0.29 0.31 0.33 0.34 0.44 0.14 0.31 0.26 0.34 0.34 0.16 0.14 0.15 0.22 0.24 0.25 0.35 0.10 0.10 0.19 0.36 0.39 0.44 0.11 0.16 0.25 0.28 0.36 0.12 0.18 0.29 0.35 0.41

tp (ms)
2.7 2.7 2.7 2.7 2.7 2.3 3.4 2.8 3.7 2.7 2.9 2.7 2.7 3.7 2.8 2.7 2.8 2.7 2.6 2.6 2.7 2.8 2.7 2.7 2.7 6.4 2.9 2.9 2.7 2.6 2.7 2.7 2.7 2.7 2.7

tb (ms)
2.3 2.3 4.4 4.0 4.0 5.7 5.5 4.3 5.0 5.3 4.6 5.3 4.0 4.8 4.9 5.3 4.9 6.8 6.6 4.6 5.0 4.9 4.0 4.0 4.0 5.5 6.2 5.2 6.8 6.8 5.3 5.3 5.3 5.3 5.3

f (Hz)
200 200 140 150 150 125 113 140 110 125 133 125 150 118 130 125 129 105 109 138 130 130 150 150 150 84 110 124 105 107 125 125 125 125 125

Arc voltage (V)


25 24 24 24 24 25 25 23 22 22 25 24 23 23 24 23 24 24 25 19 19 20 19 21 20 18 19 20 21 21 20 19 19 20 20

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of pulse parameters which may affect the weld characteristics.

2.
2.1.

Experimental
Welding

Studies on arc characteristics and behaviour of metal transfer were carried out by bead on plate weld deposition on 10 mm thick stainless steel plate by P-GMAW and conventional GMAW processes using direct current electrode positive (DCEP) CLOOS Quinto GLC 403 welding power source. The weld deposition was made by employing 1.2 mm diameter SG-1.4316-2CrNi199 stainless steel ller wire at electrode extension of 12 mm under argon shielding at a ow rate of 18 l/min. The welding was performed with stable arc at wide variation of pulse parameters as typically shown in Table 1 and the process characteristics have been studied as a function of welding parameters. The deposition of weld bead was made by operating the power source at certain pulse parameters of varying lying in the range of 0.0530.27 at different arc voltages. The pulse characteristics, such as Ip , Ib , tp and f were measured with the help of a transient recorder (maximum resolution of 1 MHz) tted with the electrical circuit of the welding set up. The arc voltage (V) and the Im were estimated as mean values of the voltage and current plots respectively of the pulse behaviour captured by the transient recorder as typically shown in Fig. 1(a) and (b) respectively. In order to compare the observations of P-GMAW the arc characteristics of conventional GMAW at different parameters have also been studied by keeping welding current of some of its parameters similar to certain mean currents of P-GMAW, as shown in Table 2. During welding the arc environment was video-graphed with the help of a high speed camera operated at a speed 104 frames per second. The camera was placed on a rigid xture in front of the arc along the line of welding. The observations on the photographs are analysed with respect to the P-GMA welding parameters by classifying the Im into three different ranges of 250 6 A, 214 4 A and 204 3 A at the arc voltage of the order of 24 1 V and also into three different ranges of 206 4 A, 184 4 and 167 7 A at the relatively lower arc voltage of 20 1 V. However in GMA welding, the

Fig. 1 Typical behaviour of pulse observed during P-GMA welding.

Table 2 The GMA welding parameters studied in globular and spray transfer modes Wire feed rate (mm/s)
67 83 92 92 100 117 158

Welding current (A)


150 157 166 170 190 195 205

Arc voltage (V)


23 23 23 24 24 24 25

Remarks
Stable arc Stable arc Stable arc Stable arc Stable arc Stable arc Stable arc

photographs have been analysed with the variation in welding current in the range of 150205 A at a given arc voltage of 24 1 V.

2.2. Measurements of arc characteristics and metal transfer


The nature of variation in arc characteristics and the behaviour of metal transfer with the change in pulse parameters in P-GMAW and similarly with the change in welding current in conventional GMAW have been studied on the high

Fig. 2 (a) Schematic diagram showing different dimensions of arc and (b) typical nature of electrode tip.

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metal resulting from high heat intensity. Thus, only in some cases the droplet detachment velocity (Vi ) could be estimated by measuring the shifting of position of a droplet as it travels further with respect to electrode tip towards the weld pool on consecutive frames at the given speed of video-graphy.

3.

Results and discussion

Fig. 3 Schematic diagram showing measurement of arc blow in terms of arc deection from electrode axis.

speed video-graphs of the welding operation. The arc characteristics dened by its root diameter (DR ), projected diameter (DP ) and length (L) was suitably measured during pulse on period by appropriate computerized scaling technique applied on number of photographs of each welding parameter as schematically shown in Fig. 2. In order to maintain a uniformity in comparable measurement the DR and L were measured with the help of a computerized projection on the arc prole through the point of curvature of downward ow of arc cavern as depicted in Fig. 2. Whereas, during pulse off period the observed deviation of arc from the electrode axis (appeared to be arc blow) was measured by a similar computerized scaling technique as schematically shown in Fig. 3. The behaviour of metal transfer was also studied by measurement of diameter (D) of the droplets using the similar computerized technique. The droplets occasionally revealed in the background of the glair of arc during their transfer to the weld pool at different welding parameters. In most of the cases they became visible for a while immediately after a pulse approaching transition of current from the peak to the base level with diminishing brightness of the arc. However, just as a matter of chance the droplets were also visible in few cases on certain consecutive frames of video-graphs during their initiation of travel towards weld pool just after detachment from the electrode tip. During their entire path of travel the droplets could not be visible primarily due to arc glair and excessive glow of molten

The arc characteristics and behaviour of metal transfer affecting the quality of weld is largely dictated by the inuence of respective welding parameters of the P-GMAW and GMAW processes on arc prole, arc pressure, stability in shielding of arc environment as well as nature of droplets transferred during welding. The nature of arc dened by its root diameter, projected diameter and length largely denotes the degree of constriction and stiffness of arc affecting the weld characteristics. However in contrast to GMAW process wherein a steady arc exists during welding, the arc characteristics of P-GMAW process are generally considered in two primary phases of strong and weak arc of the pulse on and pulse off periods respectively of the process as typically shown in Fig. 4(a) and (b) respectively.

3.1. 3.1.1.

Arc characteristics of P-GMAW process Arc prole of pulse on period

Although the arc prole observed in video-graphs may not be a true prole of the arc causing over estimation in measurement due to covering by glare of plasmatic part of shielding gas around it, but its nature of response to welding parameters is a matter of great interest to understand its inuence on weld quality. During pulse on period (tp ) the typical arc characteristics at the , Im and arc voltage of 0.27, 248 A and 25 V respectively has been shown in Fig. 5(a). Similarly at a comparatively lower , Im and arc voltage of 0.05, 181 A and 18 V respectively the arc characteristics of the pulse on period has been shown in the photograph presented in Fig. 5(b). The photographs (Fig. 5(a) and (b)) reveal that the variation in , arc voltage and mean current signicantly inuences the arc characteristics of pulse on period. Such a variation in the nature of arc characteristics at a close range of Ip of the order of 355362 A may have primarily occurred due to difference in energy distribution in entire pulse system balanced by the application of lower arc voltage and Ib of 20 V and 40 A respectively at longer tp of 6.4 ms (Table 1). It is also observed that at a given of the order of 0.050.06, a stable, but relatively weak

Fig. 4 Typical appearance of arc during (a) pulse on time at Im = 220 A and V = 25 V.

= 0.06, Im = 211 A and V = 19 V and (b) pulse off time at

= 0.21,

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Fig. 5 Typical change in arc characteristics at different welding conditions (a) Im = 181 A, V = 18 V.

= 0.27, Im = 248 A, V = 25 V and (b)

= 0.05,

arc exists at a relatively lower Im as shown in Fig. 5(b) than that observed in Fig. 4(a). At a given arc voltage of the order of 24 V the inuence of on the arc length (L), arc root diameter (DR ) and projected arc diameter (DP ) has been shown in Fig. 6(ac) respectively when the Im is varied in a range of the order of 250204 A as said earlier. Similarly at a given relatively low arc voltage of the order of 20 V the inuence of on the L, DR and DP has been shown in Fig. 7(ac) respectively when the Im is varied in a range of the order of 206167 A. The Figs. 6 and 7 show that at both the comparatively high and low arc voltages the L, DR and Dp enhances signicantly with the increase of irrespective of variation in Im at the relatively high and low levels in the range of the order of 250167 A. Whereas at a given and arc voltage the increase of Im has been found to reduce the DR and Dp but, to enhance the L appreciably. However, at a given close range of Im of 204206 A (Figs. 6 and 7) the rate of increase of L, DR and Dp with respect to varies signicantly with the change in arc voltage from 24 to 20 V. It is marked that the arc length becomes comparatively more sensitive to and Im at the lower arc voltage of 20 V, while an opposite behaviour is observed in case of the DR and Dp . Thus, it can be inferred that the arc characteristics with respect to its stiffness and spreading over the weld can be signicantly controlled by varying , Im and arc voltage by following the empirical correlation as given below. For arc voltage of 24 1 V L(24 V) = 19.95 0.0086Im 0.0631Im + 7.56 DR(24
V)

and 515 A respectively with the arc voltage of 24 V and at the Im of 504 and 691 A respectively with the arc voltage of 20 V. It may primarily happen due to high wire feed rate when it burns off or touches the job without allowing enough time to transfer droplet from the electrode. Such a logical agreement of expressions (i) and (iv) with the physical implications to a great extent justies their use for control of arc characteristics in specic application of P-GMAW. From the solutions of the Eqs. (i) and (iv) it appears that at the higher arc voltage of 24 V the increase of from 0.05 to 0.25 extinguishes arc at comparatively lower Im (corresponds to lower wire feed speed), whereas the situation becomes opposite in case of the lower arc voltage of 20 V. Thus, it may be inferred that keeping a lower and higher arc voltage of about 0.05 and 24 V respectively is more benecial for P-GMAW of thicker section with stable arc at higher wire feed rate (higher Im ) but, at lower arc voltage of the order of 20 V maintaining a higher of the order of 0.25 is more useful in this regard. This may have primarily happened because at higher arc voltage the increase of arc length becomes signicantly more sensitive to at lower mean current (Fig. 6(a)), whereas at lower arc voltage the increase of arc length becomes relatively more sensitive to at higher mean current (Fig. 7(a)).

3.1.2.

Arc prole of pulse off period

(i) (ii) (iii)

= 7.28 + 0.025Im + 0.054Im 2.49

DP(24 V) = 22.85 + 0.032Im 0.014Im + 4.02 For arc voltage of 20 1 V L(20


V)

= 3.38 0.017Im + 0.017Im + 7.97 = 14.7 + 0.027Im 0.037Im 0.655

(iv) (v) (vi)

DR(20

V)

DP(20 V) = 26.23 + 0.069Im 0.075Im 1.17

The expressions (i) and (iv) of the arc voltages of 24 and 20 V respectively resolves that during welding under the given conditions of relatively low and high (Table 1) of 0.05 and 0.25 respectively the arc extinguishes (L = 0) at the Im of 728

At the Ib , tb and arc voltage of 109 A, 4.62 ms and 25 V (Fig. 3(b)) respectively a short deected arc exists in pulse off time with no appreciable geometry of extension in between the electrode and base material. However, depending upon the magnitude of Ib , tb and arc voltage an arc of recognisable geometry may exist in pulse off period. In that case knowledge about its prole at different pulse parameters may be further useful to understand the thermal efciency of P-GMAW process. During pulse off time (tb ) the characteristics of weak arc observed at different pulse parameters and arc voltages have been qualitatively studied. At a given Im of 204206 A an arc of appreciable geometry has been found to exist in pulse off period having Ib and lying in the range of 32109 A and 0.060.25 respectively as shown in Figs. 8 and 9 for the arc voltages of the order of 24 and 20 V respectively. The typical nature of arc characteristics depicted in Figs. 8 and 9 reveal that the arc stability considered by its nondeected intense white appearance, is comparatively better at relatively lower of the order of 0.06 in comparison to that observed at higher of 0.25.

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Fig. 6 At different Im the effect of on (a) arc length (b) arc root diameter and (c) arc projected diameter during pulse on time at a given arc voltage of the order of 24 V.

Fig. 7 At different Im the effect of on (a) arc length (b) arc root diameter and (c) arc projected diameter during pulse on time at a given arc voltage of the order of 20 V.

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Fig. 8 At a given Im and arc voltage of the order of 204 A and 24 V respectively the arc characteristics of pulse off time under different pulse parameters of (a) = 0.07, Ib = 45 A and (b) = 0.25, Ib = 109 A.

Unlike to that observed in case of P-GMAW of aluminium alloy (Ghosh et al., 2007a), the weak arc at low Ib has been found to be deected from its vertical axis appearing as arc blow as a function of and Ib . The effect of and Ib on the arc deection at pulse off period has been shown in Fig. 10(a) and (b) respectively. It is observed that irrespective of the Ib varying in the range of about 40160 A an increase of predominantly enhances the arc deection almost linearly. However, at a given close range of an increase of Ib reduces the arc deection signicantly. Even a small arc in pulse off time also shows such behaviour as revealed in Fig. 4(b). It is further observed that at a moderate Im of the order of 204206 A the increase in ratio of (Ib /Ip ) in the range of 0.3510.443 enhances the arc blow signicantly at both the high and low arc voltages of the order of 24 and 20 V as shown in Figs. 8(b) and 9(b) respectively. But, at the similar orders of Im no such behaviour of arc has been observed at low (Ib /Ip ) in the range of 0.10.115 when the arc voltage varied to the same levels of the order of 24 and 20 V as shown in Figs. 8(a) and 9(a) respectively. As the increase of enhances (Table 1) the (Ib /Ip ) the arc blow also happened primarily to be there at higher of 0.25 and 0.17 as shown in Figs. 8(b) and 9(b) respectively. At this stage it appears to be interesting to point out that such biasness in directionality of arcing also sometime observed in pulse on period at high (Ib /Ip ), especially at high arc voltage of 24 1 V, as shown in Fig. 5(a). The occurrence of such behaviour of arc may create irregularities in heat distribution and related thermal characteristics of weld joint.

3.1.3.

Arc prole of conventional GMAW

The variation in arc prole with a change in welding parameter is also marked in conventional GMAW process. The typical changes in arc characteristics at a given welding current range of 150205 A with constant arc voltage of 24 1 V have been compared in Fig. 11(a)(d). The photographs reveal that arc blow primarily occurs at a comparatively lower welding current of the order of 150170 A wherein globular metal transfer exists. In this range of welding current the arc deection from the electrode axis comes down from about 22 to 15 with the increase of current upto 170 A. However, at the high welding current beyond about 190 A, establishing spray mode of metal transfer, the arc deection practically becomes negligible (Fig. 12). Such a variation in arc characteristics may have primarily occurred during globular transfer mode possibly because the arc does not cover the relatively larger droplet formed at the electrode tip due to comparatively lower electromagnetic pinch force (Rhee and Asibu, 1991).

3.2.

Arc stiffness

The stiffness of arc as a function of welding parameters plays an important role to avoid its deection from central axis which adversely affects the energy concentration in weld. The arc stiffness is generally considered as a direct function of arc pressure. The arc pressure (Pa ) can be estimated with the help of an equation derived from total pressure distribution at the perturbed boundary of solidliquid interface (Lancaster, 1987)

Fig. 9 At a given Im and arc voltage of the order of 206 A and 20 V respectively the arc characteristics of pulse off time under different pulse parameters of (a) = 0.06, Ib = 32 A and (b) = 0.17, Ib = 84 A.

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P1 =

R1

0 cos(t) cos(kz) R R2 R1

(viii)

o cos(t) cos(kz) = R

(ix)

3.2.1.

Arc stiffness in P-GMAW

Considering Eqs. (vii) and (viii) the expressions for estimation of arc pressure Pa in P-GMAW is nally derived as follows. Pa =
2 0 IP 2 R4 a 2 Ra 3R2 +

2R3 R1

(x)

Fig. 10 Inuence of (a) and (b) base current on arc deection in P-GMAW process.

by assuming arc as a hollow conducting uid cylinder of inner and outer radius equal to equilibrium radius of the molten metal (R) and arc root radius (Ra ) respectively (Rhee and Asibu, 1991). The Pa is expressed as follows
2 0 Ja

Pa =

2 [Ra R2 2o R cos(t) cos(kz)]

where, the R and R1 are assumed as the size of droplet radius (D/2) and effective radius (r) of tapering of electrode respectively. The performance of P-GMAW process is primarily characterised by its pulse current where the back ground current maintains the continuity of the process. Thus, the arc pressure Pa as a measure of arc stiffness of P-GMAW process may be primarily considered as a function of IP and the geometry of effective part of the arc along its vertical axis corroborating the metal transfer as shown in the expression (x). However, in case of existence of an arc of noticeable geometry at low current (Ib ) of pulse off time the Pa can also be estimated by the expression (x) for comparatively higher Ra , R and R1 at negligible electrode tapering. In case of welding with or without metal transfer in pulse off time the R may be assumed as equal to R1 and accordingly the Pa at Ib becomes appreciably lower than that of Ip . The intensity of this uctuation on Pa under the pulsed current depends upon the ratio of (Ib /Ip ) at different Im and . However, the effect of such uctuation of arc pressure on the arc environment is comparatively more signicant in case of a softer long arc at high arc voltage than a stiffer arc of low arc voltage. At the arc voltages of the order of 24 and 20 V the inuence of variation in at different Im on the arc pressure (Pa ) estimated at IP has been shown in Fig. 13(a) and (b) respectively. The gure shows that at both the comparatively high and low arc voltages the arc pressure or stiffness decreases signicantly with the increase of at any mean current lying in the range of 167250 A. At a given a signicant enhancement in arc stiffness occurs with the increase of Im at both the arc voltage of 24 and 20 V. However, at a given Im of the order of 204206 A the maintaining of higher arc voltage of the order of 24 V gives rise to larger arc stiffness than that observed in case of working at lower arc voltage about 20 V when the is kept constant. In view of these, the arc stiffness in terms of arc pressure as a function of and Im at the high and low arc voltages of the order of 24 and 20 V have been empirically correlated as follows. For the arc voltage of 24 1 V ln(Pa ) = 3.87 ln( ) 5.88 ln(Im ) 0.95 ln(Im ) ln( ) + 28.64 (xi) For the arc voltage of 20 1 V ln(Pa ) = 4.01 ln( ) 1.09 ln(Im ) + 0.65 ln(Im ) ln( ) + 3.59 (xii)

(vii)

2 where Ja = Ip / Ra is the arc current density during pulse on period, is angular frequency, k is a wave number and o is the amplitude of the perturbation parameter. Eq. (vii) can be resolved (Rhee and Asibu, 1991) as follows with the help of the expression of pressure (P1 ) due to surface tension attributed to the cylindrical radius (R1 ) at the perturbed boundary as proposed earlier.

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Fig. 11 Typical arc characteristics observed in GMAW at a current of (a) 150 A (b) 170 A (c) 190 A and (d) 205 A and constant arc voltage of 24 1 V.

3.2.2.

Arc stiffness in conventional GMAW

The arc pressure (Pa ) of conventional GMAW process under globular and spray modes of metal transfer has been estimated by substituting Ip of Eq. (x) by the welding current (I). The effect of welding current on arc pressure has been shown in Fig. 14. The gure depicts that at a given arc voltage of 24 V the arc pressure enhances considerably upto about 0.30.35 Kpa with the increase of welding current upto the transition current of spray mode of metal transfer of the order of 170190 A followed by a insignicant change in it with a

further increase of welding current. Whereas at a given arc voltage of 24 V a similar range of arc pressure can be obtained even at a mean current and of about 204 A and 0.2 respectively, when the arc pressure can be considerably increased further by increasing the mean current and lowering down the to about 0.05 as shown in Fig. 13(a). Thus, it may be realised that the use of P-GMAW process at appropriate Im and may be benecial to achieve higher penetration in weld pool by maintaining a spray mode of metal transfer at peak current than that can be achieved by employing conventional GMAW process.

3.3.

Behaviour of metal transfer

The diameter of droplet (D) as observed in the video-graph is typically revealed in the photograph shown in Fig. 15. The detachment of droplet from the electrode followed by its transferring movement captured in consecutive frames of video-graphs, facilitating the measurement of its detachment velocity (Vi ), is typically shown in Fig. 16. The reliability of the measured D and Vi has been veried by comparing them with their theoretical values estimated at the same welding parameters with the help of the expressions reported earlier (Randhawa et al., 2000) as stated below. Vi = (2 /
d r) 1/2

[1 + 0.187 1.226 0.142 ]

1/2

(xiii) (xiv) (xv)

D = 4r/(1 + 3/16) = Fig. 12 Arc deection observed with the change in welding current at a given arc voltage of 24 V in GMAW process.
0 2 Ip /( 2

r)

The expressions have been evaluated with the help of the experimentally measured values of effective radius (r) of tapering of electrode (Fig. 2(a) and (b)) as 0.77 0.16 mm and

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Fig. 14 At a given arc voltage of the order of 24 V the effect of welding current on arc pressure (Pa ) during globular and spray modes of metal transfer.

Fig. 15 Typical appearance of a droplet as revealed in the video-graph at = 0.18, Im = 244 A and arc voltage of 24 V. Fig. 13 At different Im the effect of on arc pressure (Pa ) during pulse on time at a given arc voltage of the order of (a) 24 V and (b) 20 V.

arc length (L) as stated above where, is coefcient of surface tension (1.2 N m1 ), d is density of molten ller metal (7507 kg m3 ) (Wang et al., 2004) and 0 is the permeability of free space (4 107 N A2 ) (Lancaster, 1987).

The comparison given in Table 3 depicts that in spite of the inherited heterogeneity of welding process and considerable difculties in proper revealing of droplet size due to intense glare, in most of the cases the measured D and Vi are well in agreement to their theoretically estimated values with an average difference of 20.7% and 7.25% respectively. During the use of pulsed current in GMAW the D and Vi primarily depends upon Ip . Thus, the inuence of Ip on measured D and Vi under

Fig. 16 Video-photographs showing typical tapering of electrode followed by transfer of droplet at a pulse parameter of = 0.08, Im = 206 A and arc voltage of 23 V.

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Table 3 Comparison between estimated and measured diameter (D) and detachment velocity (Vi ) of droplet at different Wire feed rate (mm/s)
158 158 92 125 142 125 0.20 0.24 0.27 0.21 0.06 0.17

Im (A)
248 256 248 220 211 214

IP (A)
320 300 355 320 319 274

Vi Est. (m/s

Vi Obs. (m/s)

Difference (%)
16.3 5.7 13.1 2.4 1.6 4.4 7.25

D Est. (mm)

D Obs. (mm)

Difference (%)
25 5.7 28 21.7 22.2 21.7 20.7

2.21 2.57 1.22 1.29 1.98 1.72 2.09 2.14 1.90 1.93 1.61 1.54 Average difference (%)

0.20 0.25 0.53 0.50 0.25 0.32 0.23 0.28 0.27 0.33 0.23 0.28 Average difference (%)

different lying in the range of 0.060.26 and arc voltages of 24 and 20 V has been shown in Fig. 17(a) and (b) respectively. The gures depict that the D and Vi of metal transfer in PGMAW process predominantly depends upon Ip irrespective of and arc voltage. However, in agreement to the observations

(Table 4) of earlier works on steel ((Khim and Eagar, 1993) and aluminium (Subramanium et al., 1998)) it mostly appears that at a given arc voltage the increase of shows a tendency to enhance D but to reduce Vi , whereas at a given the increase of arc voltage generally shows an afnity to enhance both the D and Vi relevantly with respect to their corresponding Ip .

3.4.

Stability in arc shielding

The stability of shielding of arc environment in gas metal arc welding process may be primarily considered through uninterrupted arc prole. The interruption of arc prole and shielding in P-GMAW process at an appropriate gas ow rate largely depends upon the degree of uctuation in arc pressure at different arc stiffness and arc length. The arc length and stiffness varies as a function of , Im and arc voltage, whereas the degree of uctuation of arc pressure signicantly depends upon the ratio of (Ib /Ip ). During pulse on period at a given Im and arc voltage of the order of 250 5 and 24 1 V respectively, a considerable disturbances in shielding environment and on natural bell shape of the arc has been observed with the increase of from 0.18 to 0.27 as shown in Figs. 5 and 18 respectively, which is in agreement to an earlier observation (Ghosh et al., 2007a) on aluminium alloy. Although such disturbance in arc prole with the increase of from 0.06 to 0.26 is also marked at a relatively low Im and arc voltage of 193 6 A and 20 1 V respectively, but its intensity has been found to be practically in signicant as shown in Fig. 19(a) and (b), which is also in the line of earlier observation on aluminium alloy as stated above. In this context here it may also be noted (Table 1) that the increase of enhances the ratio of (Ib /Ip ) but reduces the arc stiffness as function of its pressure (Fig. 13), when both of them favours the adverse inuence of uctuation

Fig. 17 Under different and arc voltages the effect of IP on (a) droplet diameter (D) and (b) detachment velocity (Vi ) of droplet.

Fig. 18 At a given Im and arc voltage of 243 A and 24 V respectively the typical turbulence in arc shielding at = 0.18.

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Table 4 Estimated Pulse parameters Ip (A)


500 400 300 400 250 0

at different pulse parameters for droplet diameter reported in earlier works Calculated f (Hz)
20 10 5 400 400 225

Observed droplet diameter (mm)

Reference

Ib (A)
180 180 180 70 100 150

tb (ms)
47.5 95 190 1.9 1.5 3.3 0.34 0.43 0.57 0.13 0.24 0.45 2.16 2.40 2.96 0.90 0.91 1.2 Khim and Eagar (1993) Subramanium et al. (1998)

Fig. 19 At a relatively low Im and arc voltage of 193 6 A and 20 1 V respectively the typical nature of arc prole with the variation in (a) = 0.06 and (b) = 0.26.

of arc pressure on stability in arc environment under the pulsed current. As it is reported earlier in case of aluminium alloy (Ghosh et al., 2007a) here also an increase in ratio of (Ib /Ip ) to about 0.289 and beyond has been found to significantly enhance the uctuation in arc pressure at low arc stiffness, especially at the high arc voltage of the order of 24 1 V, which considerably enhances the turbulence in shielding environment and disturbs the arc prole as shown in Figs. 5(a) and 18. A low , (Ib /Ip ), Im and arc voltage of the order of 0.050.06, 0.10.11, 181199 A and 1820 V is generally found suitable for maintaining a practically stable arc environment (Figs. 5(b) and 19(a)) but, a low arc voltage may allow the increase of and (Ib /Ip ) upto certain extent with practically insignicant disturbance in arc environment as it is shown in (Fig. 19(b)) with 0.26 and 0.355 respectively. Thus, it can be inferred that at any level of Im the variation in , (Ib /Ip ) and arc voltage signicantly inuences the stability of arc environment when their low values are benecial to maintain a stable arc environment in P-GMAW process. As it occurs in case of welding of aluminium alloy (Ghosh et al., 2007a), the uctuation in arcing due to large variation in Ip and Ib causing high (Ib /Ip ) ratio creates instability in shielding gas jacket resulting into formation of vortex at the boundary of arc prole penetrating the arc environment. A less stiff arc at longer arc length of higher arc voltage may become more prone to such occurrence. This behaviour is typically marked by arrows in Figs. 5(a) and 18. In both the Figs. 5(a) and 18 it also appears that in addition to uctuation of arc pressure some mechanism occurring at the area of contact of the arc with the base plate is further evolving turbulence in shielding gas disturbing the arc environment. However, during conventional GMAW at high arc voltage of 24 1 V such disturbance of arc environment has not been found to occur (Fig. 11(d)) at high welding current beyond 200 A but upto a certain extent at a relatively low welding current (Fig. 11(ac)) than this. This

mechanism may be studied further considering the characteristic of plasma ow in arc environment of stainless steel welding under the pulsed current of GMAW. An improper shielding with formation of such vortex penetrating the arc may cause air aspiration in arc environment and introduce porosity and inclusion in the weld (Ghosh and Hussain, 2002). In consideration of the observations of this work a control of arc characteristics in P-GMAW by varying the pulse parameters can be effectively explored to use this process in various applications of welding of austenitic stainless steel ranging from joining of thin sheet to thick sections. This is corroborating some earlier reported works where it is proposed that a comparatively lower , Im and arc voltage can be satisfactorily used in joining of thin sheets (Ghosh et al., 2007b), whereas an intermediate range of Im and arc voltage with lower which provides comparatively lower energy input should be used for joining of thick sections considering the facts that lower gives higher arc stiffness and droplet velocity (Ghosh et al., 2006).

4.

Conclusions

The study provides a physical realisation with basic understanding of the effects of at various pulse parameters including the arc voltage on the characteristics of arc and behaviour of metal transfer in P-GMAW process. It also critically compares the arc environment of the P-GMAW and conventional GMAW processes during bead on plate weld deposition of stainless steel. The various aspects of the studies may be primarily concluded as follows. 1. Hypothetical factor dened as a summarised inuence of pulse parameters may acts as a key to control the behaviour of arc and metal transfer in P-GMAW process.

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2. The increase in from 0.05 to 0.27 enhances the arc length, root and projected diameters of arc and droplet diameter, whereas it reduces the arc pressure and velocity of droplet. 3. Especially at high arc voltage of 24 1 V the increase of from 0.05 to 0.27 enhances the arc blow irrespective of mean current of P-GMAW. However, in case of conventional GMAW an appreciable arc blow appears during low welding current of globular metal transfer.

Acknowledgement
The authors thankfully acknowledge the nancial support provided by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Bonn to Prof. Dr. P.K. Ghosh for his stay in TU Berlin to carry out this work.

references

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Ghosh, P.K., Goyal, V.K., Dhiman, H.K., Kumar, M., 2006. Thermal and metal transfer behaviours in pulsed current GMA weld deposition of Al-Mg alloy. STWJ 11 (2), 232242. Ghosh, P.K., Hussain, H.M., 2002. Morphology and porosity content of multipass pulsed current GMA weld of AlZnMg alloy. Int. J. Join. Mater. 14 (1/2), 1627. Ghosh, P.K., Dorn, L., Hubner, M., Goyal, V.K., 2007a. Arc characteristics and behaviour of metal transfer in pulsed current GMA welding of aluminium alloy. J. Mater. Process. Technol. 194, 163175. Ghosh, P.K., Kulkarni, S.G., Kumar, M., Diman, H.K., 2007b. Pulsed current GMAW for superior weld quality of austenitic stainless steel sheet. ISIJ Int. 47 (1), 138145. Khim, Y.S., Eagar, T.W., 1993. Metal transfer in pulsed current gas metal arc welding. Weld. J. 72 (7), 279s287s. Lancaster, J.F., 1987. Metallurgy of Welding, 4th ed. Allen and Unwin, London, pp. 5457. Lyttle, K.A., 1983. GMAW a versatile process on the move. Weld. J. 62 (3), 1521. Randhawa, H.S., Ghosh, P.K., Gupta, S.R., 2000. Some basic aspects of geometrical characteristics of pulsed current vertical-up GMA weld. ISIJ Int. 40 (1), 7176. Rhee, S., Asibu, E.K., 1991. Analysis of arc pressure effect on metal transfer in gas metal arc welding. J. Appl. Phys. 70 (9), 50685075. Subramanium, S., White, D.R., Jones, J.E., Lyons, D.W., 1999. Experimental approach to selection of pulsing parameters in pulsed GMAW. Weld. J. 78 (5), 166s172s. Subramanium, S., White, D.R., Jones, J.E., Lyons, D.W., 1998. Droplet transfer in pulsed gas metal arc welding of aluminium. Weld. J. 77 (11), 458s464s. Wu, C.S., Chen, M.A., Lu, Y.F., 2005. Effect of current waveforms on metal transfer in pulsed gas metal arc welding. Meas. Sci. Technol. 16, 24592465. Wang, G., Huang, P.G., Zhang, Y.M., 2004. Numerical analysis of metal transfer in gas metal arc welding under modied pulsed current conditions. Met. Mater. Trans. B 35B, 857866.

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