Active flux tungsten inert gas welding of austenitic stainless steel AISI 304

The paper presents the effects of flux assisted tungsten inert gas (A-TIG) welding of 4 (10) mm thick austenitic stainless steel EN X5CrNi1810 (AISI 304) in the butt joint. The sample dimensions were 300 ´ 50 mm, and commercially available active flux QuickTIG was used for testing. In the planned study the influence of welding position and weld groove shape was analysed based on the penetration depth. A comparison of microstructure formation, grain size and ferrit number between TIG welding and A-TIG welding was done. The A-TIG welds were subjected to bending test. A comparative study of TIG and A-TIG welding shows that A-TIG welding increases the weld penetration depth.