Multiphysics Simulation of a Welding Process - ProductGuy2/Multiphysics-welding-examples GitHub Wiki

In many manufacturing processes, smaller components are joined together by a variety of joining techniques to form the main structure. Welding is one such commonly used joining technique. An undesirable side-effect of welding is the generation of residual stresses and deformations in the component and the quality of the weld has a substantial impact on the fatigue life of the structure. These resultant deformations may render the component unsuitable for further use. Also, the residual stresses form the input for subsequent manufacturing or structural processes.

This example demonstrates the various features available in Marc to simulate the welding process. For this purpose, the simulation of the welding of a cover plate to a cylinder is described in depth. The objective is to demonstrate the various options available to simulate the weld thermal loading, weld motion, filler element treatment and time stepping. In order to keep the problem small and run within a reasonable time interval, the mesh used is somewhat coarse, reduced integration solid elements are used and the time stepping thermal tolerances are rather loose.

A solid cylinder with a number of holes machined through it is joined to a thin cover plate. The joining is achieved through two short fillet welds placed at the junction of the cylinder and two flanges of the cover plate. The objective of the welding simulation is to study the temperatures generated during the welding process and investigate the residual stresses in the component after welding

Only half the model is considered herein. Though the four welds (2 on each half) are placed sequentially and the whole model should be considered for a full description of the welding effects, in order to understand the local stresses and deformations effects introduced by each weld, only the half-model is considered here. The solid cylinder of radius 100 mm is modeled using hexahedral elements. The cover plate of radius 125 mm and flanges are modeled using shell elements. Weld filler 1 is modeled using shell elements and weld filler 2 is modeled using solid elements.

See weld.proc in the repo