Study of ultrasonic vibrations’ effect on friction stir welding

In this paper, effect of ultrasonic vibrations on friction stir welding (FSW) is studied. Ultrasonic vibrations were employed on the tool in pin direction (perpendicular to the welding direction). To do this study, a vibration tool was designed by Abaqus software in a way to have a longitudinal frequency about 20 kHz and was then manufactured and assembled with an ultrasonic transducer and was controlled using an ultrasonic generator to oscillate ultrasonically with a peak-to-peak amplitude of 10 μm. After preparation of experimental setup, some experiments were performed on AA6061-T6 as a work material, and the effect of ultrasonic vibrations on force, temperature, tensile strength, and hardness was investigated in FSW. Based on the achieved results, ultrasonic vibrations can decrease force and increase temperature in FSW.