A NON-DESTRUCTIVE EVALUATION METHOD; MEASURING THE FIXED STRENGTH OF SPOT WELDED JOINT POINTS BY SURFACE ELECTRIC RESISTIVITY

Destructive tests are generally applied for evaluating fixed strength of spot welding nuggets on zinc plating steel, which is swidely used as the primary automobile structural material. Destructive tests, however, are expensive and time consuming. This paper discusses a non-destructive method for evaluating of welded joints fixed strength by utilizing surface electric resistance. A nugget tester has developed by authors for this purpose. The non-destructive method focuses on surface electric resistance decreasing rate; a, and effect of the corona bond. Nugget diameter is estimated by R-Quota calculated from variation of resistance and constant representing the area of the corona bond. Since maximum tensile strength is correlated with the nugget diameter, it is inferred from the estimated nugget diameter.