Investigation of Material and Mechanical Properties of Laser Beam Welded (LBW) Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) and Wrought Titanium Alloy Samples A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Engineering Ali Tamaddon B. (Mechanical Engineering), Azad University, Tehran P. (Institute of Engineers Australia), Canberra, ACT School of Engineering College of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics RMIT University November 2021 Declaration I certify that except where due acknowledgement has been made, this research is that of the author alone; the content of this research submission is the result of work which has been carried out since the official commencement date of the approved research program; any editorial work, paid or unpaid, carried out by a third party is acknowledged; and, ethics procedures and guidelines have been followed. In addition, I certify that this submission contains no material previously submitted for award of any qualification at any other university or institution, unless approved for a joint-award with another institution, and acknowledge that no part of this work will, in the future, be used in a submission in my name, for any other qualification in any university or other tertiary institution without the prior approval of the University, and where applicable, any partner institution responsible for the joint-award of this degree.
I acknowledge that copyright of any published works contained within this thesis resides with the copyright holder(s) of those works. I give permission for the digital version of my research submission to be made available on the web, via the University’s digital research repository, unless permission has been granted by the University to restrict access for a period of time. I acknowledge the support I have received for my research through the provision of an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship. Ali Tamaddon, 19/11/2021 Ali Tamaddon Page | ii Acknowledgements: This is to acknowledge the start of a new chapter in my life and a career in research.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Professor Sabu John and Distinguished Professor Milan Brandt for their unequivocal support, guidance, and mentorship, which will never be forgotten. Their invaluable knowledge and wisdom have been a beacon of reckoning throughout these years. I would like to thank key RMIT staff that assisted me throughout this research: Mr. Alan Jones of the Advanced Manufacturing Precinct (AMP) and Dr.
Matthew Field and Dr. Edwin Mayes from the RMIT Microscopy and Microanalysis Facility (RMMF) and Dr. Wei Qian Song from the RMIT Bundoora East Material Testing Laboratories. I would also like to thank my dearest son Mr.
Daniel Tamaddon for his patience and understanding during this period and Dr. Mohammad Mehdizadeh who encouraged me to start this journey. A list of many good friends who supported me throughout this process would be too long for this limited space and includes but is not limited to Dr. Joe Elambasseril and Dr.
Nabi Chowdhury to name a few. Ali Tamaddon Page | iii Table of Contents Declaration. iii Table of Contents. iv List of Tables.
viii List of Figures .2 Overview of additive manufacturing (AM) .3 Metal additive manufacturing .4 Laser powder bed fusion (LPBF).3 Build shielding gas .5 Laser beam welding (LBW).1 Introduction to lasers. Materials and Methodology .2 First Phase: Pilot Samples .1 Design of experiments. 35 Ali Tamaddon Page | iv 3.3 Fabrication of Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) parts .4 Laser Beam Welding.5 Cross section and metallographic preparation .7 Weld porosity studies .3 Second Phase: Main Samples.1 Design of experiments .2 Fabrication of parts .3 Pre-testing measurement and testing: .4 Tensile test set up: .5 Fatigue test set up: .6 Post-test examinations:. Results and Discussion .1 Weld appearance and comparison to AWI standards .1 Weld area measurement, shape, and penetration profile .3 Scanning Electron Microscopy .1 EDS and chemical composition results .2 Microstructure and EBSD results .1 Design of experiments .1 Tensile test setup .2 Single piece wrought and LPBF tensile tests.3 Porosity analysis – Single piece wrought and LPBF .4 Welded wrought to LPBF assembly tensile tests.
100 Ali Tamaddon Page | v 4.1 Pre-test porosity analysis – Wrought to LPBF .2 Tensile tests – Wrought to LPBF .3 Post-test CT scan – Wrought to LPBF .5 Welded LPBF to LPBF assembly tensile tests .6 Tensile tests – LPBF to LPBF .7 Post-test CT scans – LPBF to LPBF .1 Design of experiments .2 Single piece wrought fatigue tests .3 Pre-test porosity analysis – single piece wrought.4 Fatigue test – single piece wrought .5 Post-test SEM – single piece wrought.6 Single piece LPBF fatigue tests .7 Pre-test porosity analysis – single piece LPBF.8 Fatigue test – single piece LPBF .9 Post-test CT scan – single piece LPBF.10 Post-test SEM – single piece LPBF.11 Welded wrought to LPBF assembly fatigue tests .12 Pre-test porosity analysis – wrought to LPBF .13 Fatigue test – wrought to LPBF .14 Post-test CT scan – wrought to LPBF .15 Post-test SEM – wrought to LPBF .16 Welded LPBF to LPBF assembly fatigue tests .17 Pre-test porosity analysis – LPBF to LPBF .18 Fatigue test – LPBF to LPBF .19 Post-test CT scan – LPBF to LPBF .20 Post-test SEM – LPBF to LPBF .3 Tensile strength and fatigue performance .2 Post weld processing. 172 Ali Tamaddon Page | vi 5.3 Build parameters effect on weldability.4 Impact of geometry on weld performance .5 Enhance statistical confidence of results. 172 Ali Tamaddon Page | vii List of Tables Table 2-1. (Page 15) Cost comparison of titanium vs.
steel and aluminium. (Page 36) Primary Design of Experiment for pilot sample weld parameters. (Page 37) Nominal chemical composition of Titanium alloy grade 5 used for this research, as per ASTM F2924-14. (Page 39) LPBF base material build parameters.
(Page 53) Proposed design of experiment for tensile tests as per ASTM E8. (Page 54) Proposed design of experiment for fatigue tests as per ASTM E466.4M:2014 – guide for the fusion welding of titanium and titanium alloys. (Page 72) Summary of weld parameters, resulting energy density and welded joint fusion zone cross section area on pilot samples as measured using digital microscopy. (Page 75) Ti6Al4V raw material properties.
(Page 77) Phase identification in fusion zone of pilot sample number 9. (Page 98) ASTM E8 tensile test results on wrought single piece samples. (Page 105) ASTM E8 tensile test results for LPBF to wrought welded samples. (Page 110) ASTM E8 tensile test results for LPBF-to-LPBF welded samples, note the close proximity of the UTS to breaking strength and relative short overall elongation prior to breakage.
(Page 118) ASTM E466 fatigue test results for single piece wrought samples. (Page 122) ASTM E466 fatigue test results for single piece LPBF samples. (Page 131) ASTM E466 fatigue test results for LPBF to wrought welded assemblies. (Page 152) ASTM E466 fatigue test results for LPBF to LPBF welded assemblies.
Ali Tamaddon Page | viii List of Figures Figure 2-1. Courtesy Ernest Young (EY_Global 2019b). Courtesy (Khorasani et al. Metallic Materials Properties Development and Standardization (MMPDS) data for cast, wrought machined data are shown for comparison (Lewandowski & Seifi 2016).
(Page 22) Schematic representation of possible process by-products courtesy (Ladewig et al. (Page 22) Schematic of defect induced by recoating during LPBF process. (Page 25) Trump TruLaser Cell 7020 weld setup. Laser beam comes from above and nozzle feeds the inert shielding gas to the work area.
(Page 27) Tensile test results related to the porosity ratio in welding area, according to the average power variation (Akman et al. (Page 27) Microhardness distribution of workpieces for different average power (Akman et al. (Page 37) Titanium grade 5 alloy wrought sheets. (Page 39) SLM Solutions ™ SLM 250, metal additive manufacturing machine.
(Page 40) 20mm x 20mm x 4mm LPBF fabricated Ti64 plates for preliminary welding experiments. (Page 41) Trumpf TruLaser Cell 7020 welding machine and interface. Ali Tamaddon Page | ix Figure 3-6. (Page 42) Custom jig to hold the square samples in compression for welding and diagram of weld direction used.
(Page 42) Welding set up inside the Trumpf Trulaser ™ Cell 7020 robotic laser welding machine chamber. (Page 43) Trial runs on provisional samples, to verify weld parameters. Note the direction of welds marked on far-right sample in image. (Page 44) Work in progress of the pilot sample fabrication.
(Page 45) Struers Labotom-3 manual table-top lab size cutting machine. (Page 46) Struers CitoPress phenolic resin mounting machine. (Page 46) Struers RotoPol-21 and RotoForce-4 polishing machine. (Page 47) Keyence VHX-5000 Digital optical microscope.
(Page 48) Phoenix v| Tome|x s CT scanner at RMIT Bundoora East campus. (Page 49) Image of VG Studio 3. (Page 52) FEI Nova NanoSEM 200. (Page 52) Microhardness measurements performed on cross section.
(Page 55) Work in progress of main samples fabrication in the SLM® 250HL machine. (left) (Page 56) Additively manufactured tensile testing half specimens as per ASTM E8 prior to welding, note elongated tabs the junction for welding, these are incorporated to accommodate any anomalies occurring at the start and finish of each weld. These tabs are machined off and result in a fully compliant geometry as per ASTM E8. (right) wrought titanium alloy half specimens alongside baseline samples, these are used to establish the experiment reference data necessary for this research.
(Page 57) (left) Additively manufactured fatigue testing half specimens as per ASTM E466 prior to welding. Note the provision for welding tabs, similar to tensile testing samples. (right) wrought titanium alloy half specimens alongside baseline fatigue full samples. (Page 58) Custom jig to accommodate ASTM E8 and E466 autogenous welding in the Trumpf Trulaser ™ Cell 7020 robotic laser welding machine.
Ali Tamaddon Page | x Figure 3-25. (Page 59) Machined Fatigue and Tensile samples post machining and ready for tests. (Page 61) MTS Landmark 100kN Servohydraulic Test System, material testing machine. Material testing laboratory, RMIT University, Bundoora East, Victoria.
(Page 63) Polycarbonate ballistic shield to protect against flying debris. (Page 67) Top side of welded pilot samples. (Page 67) Bottom side of welded pilot samples. (Page 69 – 71) Combined cross section area of fusion and heat affected zones.
(Page 72) Scatterplot of combined fusion zone (FZ) and heat affected zone (HAZ) area versus welding energy density. (Page 74) (Top) Cross section of welded joint as visible via SEM microscope. (Bottom) Energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) results across welded joint, sample number 8. (Page 75) Energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) results of base metal (BM) at the additive manufactured side of sample number 8.
(Page 76) Electron backscatter diffraction images of fusion zone on sample 9. Top left shows the overall area under study, with the zoomed area highlighted in the top right image. Needle shaped titanium alloy grains captured middle left using the parameters above middle right. Phase identification bottom left and highlighted of Titanium hexagonal close packed (HCP) crystals bottom right.
(Page 77) Zoomed out phase identification of pilot sample number 9. (Page 80) Porosity profile of pilot sample number 6, welded at 2000 Watts and 1200mm/min.28% of overall region of interest (ROI) consists of pores. 241 defects were detected at a mean diameter of 0.14mm, with a mean sphericity of 0. (Page 81) Porosity profile of pilot sample number 9, welded at 2200 Watts and 1200mm/min.
Note that only 0.12% of overall region of interest (ROI) consists of pores. 99 defects were detected at a mean diameter of 0.12mm, with a mean sphericity of 0. (Page 82) There is direct relationship between porosity and mean pore size. (Page 83) There is direct relationship between laser welding power levels and the amount of porosity in the final resulting welded joint.
This is shown with a probability value (P-value) of 0. Ali Tamaddon Page | xi Figure 4-13. (Page 83) There is an inverse relationship between the welding laser beam travel speed and the resulting porosity, with a P-value of 0.