Engineers at The University of Strathclyde’s Advanced Forming Research Centre (AFRC) are exploring the use of rotary friction welding to help reduce materials wastage and production time.
Rotary Friction Welding is a solid-state technique that works by rotating one part at high speed whilst pressing it against another stationary part. The resulting friction heats the parts and “welds” them together.
As well as being faster and more energy efficient than alternative welding techniques, the process is also claimed to produce higher integrity welds.
Though it is currently used across a number of niche manufacturing areas within the aerospace and oil and gas sectors, the AFRC team hopes that its work will help open up wider applications for the process.
Working with two rotary friction welding machines, the biggest of their kind in any UK research centre, AFRC engineers and technicians are looking at how the capability could be integrated with other advanced manufacturing techniques used at the centre.
One of the initial projects using the new equipment will see rotary friction welding used alongside other capabilities at the centre to develop a high performance, high integrity component for aerospace applications.
Dr Laurie da Silva, Research Associate at the AFRC, who is leading the development of this new capability, explained: “Welding is often regarded in the manufacturing industry as an easy place for a material to fail. This, however, isn’t the case for rotary friction welding, instead it generates a very strong, high integrity joint for metallic materials.
We’re working with our members and partners on an industrial research programme that will demonstrate the considerable potential of this technology. Combining it with manufacturing techniques, such as flow forming, rotary forging and radial forging, we’re aiming to create new hybrid near net shape manufacturing processes for similar and dissimilar alloys.”
The centre – which is part of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult network – said that it has already received significant interest in its new rotary friction welding capability.
This is old technology – even for the automotive industry, with the exception (I think) of friction welding dissimilar metals. So what’s new? I was taught about the process at college in the early 70’s. Google searches will result in several production machines on the market, am confused….
Are you, by any chance, confusing it with friction stir welding? They aren’t quite the same thing.
Rotary Friction welding is a process that has had numerous applications in the high production automotive industry since the early 1960’s e.g. engine valves, wheels, steering columns, drive shafts to name a few. Dissimilar metal joints have been utilised in the cryogenic and ship building industries to name only two applications.
Friction Stir Welding is a process invented in the early to mid 1990’s by Wayne Thomas and is for joining, mainly, aluminium sheet/plate joints.
I was involved with looking (working in aerospace) at linear friction welding and (on the periphery) of modelling rotary or inertial friction welding (both these, essentially, axisymmetric); these processes have been in use in industry for some years
In these processes large frictional loads are generated in cold material to heat it up until it is hot and very soft – whence it flows and is extruded between the contacting areas (by flow this is the hot creep flow for forging of metals).
Friction stir welding is a more recent development and was invented about 1991 (by TWI) and, it too, involves frictional heating and hot creep flow but utilises a forging/forming tool which spins and traverses the joint line between two sheets of material.
All these processes involve hot solid state forming and welding which, unlike fusion welding, is not so prone to residual stress and results in a strong joint and little, if any heat affected zone
JCB have been welding their hydraulic piston heads to the rods for many years. Its certainly not new.
I watched this being done back in the 80s, joining lengths of pipe together so not so new.
I have often felt that decoupling the frictional heating from the forming part of the (solid state) diffusion welding would be advantageous in reducing the loads and making the machinery more useful and capable and affordable; i.e. pre-heating the areas to be bonded.
I believe that NASA did some work on that; I think they used lasers to pre-heat for friction stir welding – but induction could be used too.
That would make these processes less brutal and more capable and, too by being affordable, more widely applicable and used.
I should say that I believe that considering the alternatives (and advantages) to fusion welding would be a good thing for design engineers
I am sorry to appear a party-pooper, but this, like several other recent developments described in our illustrious organ looks like a University (academics, whatever that means) starting a programme (having ‘got’ some cash from a ‘pot’ no-one else spotted initiated by a Government Department whose staff know little or nothing about the field) without asking those who do know it- those like the bloggers who comment above!- what would be best. So nothing new there.
Well said!!
I tend to agree. But feel sad that advantages of solid state welding and the need for research in delivering it are, thence, being ignored.
I think it’s fair to say that the “potential” of linear friction welding has been realised. It has been around long enough. I wonder how much the taxpayer has sunk into this…
Friction welding was the standard method of producing car steering columns at the Torrington Comany’s Universal Joint Division back in the 1970’s. The two parts were popped in collet chucks and the machine run up to red heat. An abrupt bang, and the machine freewheeled to a stop as the column cooled. I will never forget the look on the face of a young female operator the first time she loaded and ran up the machine.
NEW? The rear wheel hubs from the first Fiesta were friction welded to the central tube.
There are a lot of welding process that have been around for a long time. Should we only teach new process? Friction Welding is defiantly under utilized and if it is not, it could be used more. What should be taught is application of technology and process of determining the proper use of it and best methods of determining what process to utilize.