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Influence of Tool Shape on Friction Stir Welded Joint of Aluminum and Steel
with Circular Weld Line

Article  in  Procedia Engineering · December 2014

DOI: 10.1016/j.proeng.2014.10.291

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Toshiaki Yasui Masahiro Fukumoto

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Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097

11th International Conference on Technology of Plasticity, ICTP 2014, 19-24 October 2014,
Nagoya Congress Center, Nagoya, Japan

Influence of tool shape on friction stir welded joint

of aluminum and steel with circular weld line
Toshiaki Yasuia,*, Hiroki Mizushimaa, Masami Tsubakia, Tomoyuki Fujitab, Masahiro
Fukumotoa
a
Toyohashi University of Technology, Toyohashi, Aichi 441-8580, JAPAN
b
Musashi Seimitsu Industry Co. Ltd, Toyohashi, Aichi 441-8560, JAPAN

Abstract

For the weight reduction of drive train in automotive, it is necessary to fabricate circular weld of die casting aluminum alloy
and carbon steel with high welding efficiency. In this study, friction stir welding of ADC12 and S45C with circular weld line
was evaluated, and the effect of welding tool shape was investigated for improving the weldability. The welding tool with flat
shoulder was possible to fabricate the weld of ADC12 and S45C with a thin reaction layer with less than 1Pm. However, the
mechanical strength of the weld was lower than that of ADC12. This is attributed to the microstructure of weld interface. Thus,
material flow during FSW was enhanced by using a welding tool with a screw probe and a scroll shoulder. The fabricated weld
by the welding tool achieved high weld strength equivalent to ADC12. In this weld, uniform and thin reaction layer about 50
nm was formed on the weld interface.
© 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
© 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of Nagoya University and Toyohashi University of Technology.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Nagoya University
Keywords: Dissimilar welding; Friction stir welding; Circular welding

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +81-532-44-6703; fax: +81-532-44-6690.

E-mail address: yasui@me.tut.ac.jp

1877-7058 © 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Nagoya University
doi:10.1016/j.proeng.2014.10.291
 Toshiaki Yasui et al. / Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097 2093

1. Introduction

Weight saving of automotive body is an important issue for reduction of fuel consumption. However, it is
difficult to construct all the automotive body by light weight material, such as light metal and plastics, for the
problem of strength and cost of materials. Then, it is better to fabricate hybrid structure to achieve weight saving.
Among the materials, aluminum and steel are promising combination for this purpose. Thus, there is a necessity to
weld between aluminum and steel. Conventional fusion welding method is difficult to achieve this demand due to
formation of fragile thick intermetallic compound (IMC) layer more than 1Pm in the weld interface.
Friction stir welding (FSW) is one of the solid state welding techniques to weld aluminum alloys. This method
is possible to reduce the heat input during welding. We successfully achieved welding between aluminum alloy and
steel by FSW with welding tool offset from the weld line [1-4]. The probe of welding tool stirs aluminum and
slightly grids the steel surface. Heat input to the weld and material flow around the tool is controlled with rotating
speed and welding speed. Fabricated weld has a thin IMC layer less than 1Pm on the weld interface, and achieved
high welding efficiency. However, the weldability is different with kinds of aluminum, weld line shape, and work
piece size. Die casting aluminum alloy of ADC12 is widely used material for automotive application. For the
weight reduction of the drive train, it is promising to construct the parts as axisymmetric hybrid components of
aluminum and steel. Thus, it is necessary to fabricate circular weld of ADC12 and steel with high welding
efficiency. The objective of this study is to evaluate the weldability of FSW between ADC12 and S45C with
circular weld line, and to elucidate the effect of welding tool shape for improvement of the weld joint.

2. Experimental procedure

The materials used in this study are die casting aluminum alloy of ADC12 and carbon steel of S45C. Fig. 1
shows a schematic figure of FSW between aluminum and steel with circular weld line. S45C plate with 60 mm in
outer diameter is placed on the inside, and ADC12 plate with 100 mm in outer diameter and 60 mm in inner
diameter is placed on the outside. A welding tool is composed of a shoulder with 20 mm in diameter and a probe
with 5 mm in diameter and 4 mm in length. The welding tool rotates counter clock wise direction and the probe is
plunged into weld interface of aluminum side. The welding tool moves along the weld interface with advancing
side (AS) facing in the steel surface, and slightly grinds the steel surface.

Rotating
direction Welding tool

Al Fe Shoulder
A A Probe
Fe Al
Welding
direction
Weld interface
 

(a) Top view (b) Cross sectional view of A-A

Fig. 1. FSW of aluminum and steel with circular weld line.

Material flow around probe is affected by welding tool shape. In this study, two types of probe shapes and two
type of shoulder are selected as shown in Table 1. The screw probe is effective to induce downward material flow
around the probe [5, 6]. The scroll shoulder has a spiral groove from the edge of the shoulder to the root of probe.
2094 Toshiaki Yasui et al. / Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097

The spiral groove transfers the material on the edge of the shoulder to the root of the probe, and is effective to
fabricate smooth weld surface for FSW of aluminums [7]. There is a possibility to improve the weld beat enhance
the material flow. The welding conditions are shown in Table 2 for each welding tool. As for scroll shoulder, it
was difficult to conduct the welding at 4000 min-1 of rotating speed and 50 mm/min of welding speed due to tool
breakage.
Tensile strength of welds was measured by test pieces cutout from the weld as shown in Fig.2. Torsional
shearing strength of welds was measured with a torsion fatigue testing machine as shown in Fig.3. For both
experiments, the weld surface was grinded with 0.5 mm depth to eliminate the effect of weld beat shape. The cross
section microstructure of weld interface was observed by SEM and TEM.

Table 1. Specification of welding tool.

Shoulder type Flat, Scroll

Shoulder diameter (mm) I 20
Probe type Straight, Screw (M5)
Probe diameter (mm) I5
Probe length (mm) 4

Table 2. Welding conditions.

Welding tool (Shoulder/Probe) Flat/Straight Flat/Screw Scroll/Screw

Rotating speed (min-1) 4000 4000 1500
Welding speed (mm/min) 100 100 220

20 10
Welding tool
0.5
7

1.5

Fe Fe Al

Al

Fig. 2. Specification of tensile strength test specimen.

Fixture
ADC12 Rotation
S45C

Weld interface Weld specimen

Fig. 3. Torsional shearing strength test for circular weld.
 Toshiaki Yasui et al. / Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097 2095

3. Results and Discussion

Fig. 4 shows the appearance of weld surface and cross section of weld with various shape of welding tool. As
for straight probe with flat shoulder, the weld surface is smooth, but there is a cavity on the bottom of probe trace
in the cross section of weld. As for screw probe with flat shoulder, there is no defect in side of the weld. However,
the large flash was appeared on the weld surface, and decrease of thickness of weld surface due to loss of material.
As for screw probe with scroll shoulder, there is no defect inside of the weld. Although the weld surface shows
small defect on it, the smooth weld surface was obtained.

Probe Shoulder Appearance Cross section

Straight Flat

Screw Flat

Screw Scroll

Fig. 4. Appearance and cross section of welds for various welding tool.

Table 3 shows the tensile strength of each weld. The tensile strength for straight probe with flat shoulder is
lower than the others. As for flat shoulder, the weld fractured at weld interface and could not achieve high strength.
The fracture surface shows smooth and brittle fracture surface. However, the tensile strength for screw probe with
scroll shoulder achieved higher strength which is comparable to the strength of base metal ADC12 and fracture at
ADC12.

Table 3. Tensile strength of welds for various welding tool.

Material Shoulder Probe Tensile strength (MPa) Fracture point

ADC12 - - 309 -
Flat Straight 150 Interface fracture
ADC12/S45C Flat Screw  Interface fracture
Scroll Screw 296 Fracture at ADC12

Table 4 shows the torsional shearing strength of each specimen. Torsional shearing strength of ADC12 was
evaluated from the tensile strength of ADC12 and estimated weld area of ADC12/S45C weld. The torsional
shearing strength for flat shoulder is lower than the value of ADC12. The torsional shearing strength for scroll
shoulder could not be measured due to the deformation of fixture during measurement. However, the torsional
shearing strength for scroll shoulder is higher than that for flat shoulder.
2096 Toshiaki Yasui et al. / Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097

Table 4. Torsional shearing strength of welds for various welding tool.

Material Shoulder Probe Torsional shearing strength (kNm)

ADC12 - - 6.99*
Flat Straight 1.94
ADC12/S45C Flat Screw 
Scroll Screw > 3.5
*) Estimated value from tensile strength of base metal and weld area.

Fig. 5 shows the cross section microstructure of weld interface. A thin reaction layer less than 1Pm was
observed with SEM at the weld interface for flat shoulder. The thickness for straight probe is thicker than that for
screw probe. As for scroll shoulder, it was difficult to identify the reaction layer with SEM. Thus, the weld
interface was observed with TEM and very thin reaction layer about 50 nm is observed as shown in Fig. 5. The
layer was uniformly formed on the weld interface. The welding tool with a screw probe and a scroll shoulder
achieved highest tensile strength and torsional shearing strength. This is attributed to this microstructure of weld
interface.
Probe Shoulder Low magnification High magnification

ADC12 S45C 0.8Pm

Straight Flat

200μm 1μm

Screw Flat 780 K

0.3μm

200μm 1μm

50nm
Screw Scroll

200μm 0.5μm

Fig. 5. Cross section microstructure of weld interface for various welding tool.

4. Conclusion

Friction stir welding of ADC12 and S45C with circular weld line was performed, and effect of welding tool
shape was investigated for improving the weldability. Following results were obtained.
(1) The welding tool with a flat shoulder was difficult to fabricate sound weld of ADC12 and S45C due to
generation of defect on the weld surface or on the bottom of tool probe.
(2) The welding tool with a scroll shoulder was possible to fabricate the weld of ADC12 and S45C with a thin
uniform reaction layer about 50nm in thickness. The tensile strength of the weld was equivalent to ADC12.
 Toshiaki Yasui et al. / Procedia Engineering 81 (2014) 2092 – 2097 2097

Acknowledgements

This study was partially supported by “The Knowledge Hub of AICHI”, The Priority Research Project.

References

[1] Yasui T., Shimoda Y., Tsubaki M., Fukumoto M., 2004. Materials Science Forum 449-452, 433.
[2] Fukumoto M., Tsubaki M., Shimoda Y., Yasui T., 2004. Quarterly J. Japan Welding Society 22, 309.
[3] Yasui T., Shimoda Y., Tsubaki M., Ishii T., Fukumoto M., 2005. Quarterly J. Japan Welding Society 23, 469.
[4] Yasui T., Shimoda Y., Ishii T., Tsubaki M., Fukumoto M., 2007. Quarterly J. Japan Welding Society 25, 426.
[5] Shimoda Y., Tsubaki M., Yasui T., Fukumoto M., Fujita T., Osawa J., 2010. steel research international 81, 1108.
[6] Shimoda Y., Tsubaki M., Yasui T., Fukumoto M., 2011. Quarterly J. Japan Welding Society 29, 114s.
[7] Fuller C. B., 2007. Friction Stir Welding and Processing Chap.2, ASM International, Ohio, 7.

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