Weld bonding of stainless steel

This paper presents a theoretical and experimental investigation of the weld bonding of stainless steels with the purpose of setting up the major technological parameters that are needed for its industrial implementation. Several commercial adhesives, with varying working times under different surface conditions are investigated for assembling standard test specimens. The numerical simulation of the process based on the commercial finite element program SORPAS is successfully utilized to help establish the most favourable welding parameters that allow spot-welding through the adhesives. The relative performance and quality of the resulting weld bonded joints is evaluated against alternative solutions based on adhesives or conventional spot-welding by means of macroetching observations, tension-shear tests and peel tests. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.