INNOVATIONS IN FRICTION STIR WELDING FOR MARINE APPLICATIONS

Cater talks about the innovations in friction stir welding for maritime application among others. Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is a solid-state welding process invented by The Welding Institute in 1991 and subsequently widely used for the fabrication of structures reauiring high strength, lightweight fatigue resistant joints. The process was originally developed for joining aluminium, as this is considered a difficult material to weld, and was subsequently developed for other hard to weld metals such as magnesium and copper. FSW was quickly adopted as a fabrication technique for spacecraft, trains, shipping and automotive components, as well as electronics assemblies and consumer goods, all applications where aluminium joints needed to be made that were strong, tough, fatigue resistant and lightweight. The physical, forging nature of FSW olaces some constraints on the weld geometries that can be achieved as the two faying surfaces are required to be brought into close contact and filler metal is not available to make up any significant gaps.