Effects of Fusion Zone Size on Failure Modes and Performance of Advanced High Strength Steel Spot Welds

This paper examines the effects of fusion zone size on failure modes, static strength and energy absorption of resistance spot welds (RSW) of advanced high strength steels (AHSS). DP800 and TRIP800 spot welds are considered. The main failure modes for spot welds are nugget pullout and interfacial fracture. Partial interfacial fracture is also observed. The critical fusion zone sizes to ensure nugget pull-out failure mode are developed for both DP800 and TRIP800 using the limit load based analytical model and the micro-hardness measurements of the weld cross sections. Static weld strength tests using cross tension samples were performed on the joint populations with controlled fusion zone sizes. The resulted peak load and energy absorption levels associated with each failure mode were studied using statistical data analysis tools. The results in this study show that the conventional weld size of 4 t can not produce nugget pullout mode for both the DP800 and TRIP800 materials. The results also suggest that performance based spot weld acceptance criteria should be developed for different AHSS spot welds.