Numerical Investigation on Fracture Initiation Properties of Interface Crack in Dissimilar Steel Welded Joints

Fracture toughness property is of significant importance when evaluating structural safety.The current research of fracture toughness mainly focused on crack in homogeneous material and experimental results.When the crack is located in a welded joint with high-gradient microstructure and mechanical property distribution,it becomes difficult to evaluate the fracture toughness behavior since the stress distribution may be affected by various factors.In recent years,numerical method has become an ideal approach to reveal the essence and mechanism of fracture toughness behavior.This study focuses on the crack initiation behavior and driving force at different interfaces in dissimilar steel welded joints.The stress and strain fields around the crack tip lying at the interfaces of ductile-ductile,ductile-brittle and brittle-brittle materials are analyzed by the numerical simulation.For the interface of ductile-ductile materials,the strain concentration on the softer material side is responsible for ductile fracture initiation.For the ductile-brittle interface,the shielding effect of the ductile material plays an important role in decreasing the fracture driving force on the brittle material side.In the case of brittle-brittle interface,a careful matching is required,because the strength mismatch decreases the fracture driving force in one side,whereas the driving force in another side is increased.The results are deemed to offer support for the safety assessment of welded structures.

Interfacial microstructure evolution of 12Cr1MoV/TP347H dissimilar steel welded joints during aging

The interfacial microstructure evolution of 12Cr1MoV/TP347H dissimilar steel welded joints with a nickel-based filler metal during aging was studied in detail to elucidate the mechanism of premature failures of this kind of joints.The results showed that not only a band of granular Cr_(23)C_(6)carbides were formed along the fusion boundary in the ferritic steel during aging,but also a large number of granular or plate-like Cr_(23)C_(6)carbides,which have a cube-cube orientation relationship with the matrix,were also precipitated on the weld metal side of the fu-sion boundary,making this zone be etched more easily than the other zone and become a dark etched band.Stacking faults were found in some Cr_(23)C_(6)carbides.In the as-welded state,deformation twins were observed in the weld metal with a fully austenitic structure.The peak micro-hardness was shifted from the ferritic steel side to the weld metal side of the fusion boundary after aging and the peak value increased signific-antly.Based on the experimental results,a mechanism of premature failures of the joints was proposed.

Microstructure and properties in dissimilar/similar weld joints between DP780 and DP980 steels processed by fiber laser welding

The microstructure and mechanical properties（strength, fatigue and formability） of dissimilar/similar weld joints between DP780 and DP980 steels were studied. The microstructure in fusion zone（FZ） was lath martensite（LM）, and alloying elements in the FZ were uniformly distributed. The hardness in the FZ of dissimilar weld joint was similar to the average value（375 HV） of the two similar weld joints. The microstructural evolution in heat affected zone（HAZ） of dissimilar/similar weld joints was as follows：LM（coarse-grained HAZ） →finer LM（fine-grained HAZ） →M-A constituent and ferrite（intercritically HAZ） →tempered martensite（TM） and ferrite（sub-critical HAZ）. Lower hardness in intercritically HAZ and sub-critical HAZ（softening zones） was observed compared to base metal（BM） in dissimilar/similar weld joints. The size of softening zone was 0.2-0.3 mm and reduction in hardness was ~7.6%-12.7% of BM in all the weld joints, which did not influence the tensile properties of weld joints such that fracture location was in BM. Formability of dissimilar weld joints was inferior compared to similar weld joints because of the softening zone, non-uniform microstructure and hardness on the two sides of FZ. The effect of microstructure on fatigue life was not influenced due to the presence of welding concavity.