Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems

Spotlight on Research - Weld Element Technology Development

Resistance spot welding is a common joining process used in automotive manufacturing, with thousands of spot welds in a single vehicle. When simulating the behavior of a vehicle under crash conditions, the mechanical behavior of the spot welds under the dynamic loading must be incorporated. Currently spot welds are simulated using a weld element based on a simple beam theory, and a next generation spot weld element is needed in which details of the welding process and the metallurgy of the parent material are reflected.

We envision developing a next generation weld element for simulating a resistance welded joint under impact loading and assessing the applicability of this new technology for impact simulations using lightweight alloys.

A detailed finite element model will be developed and used to predict the strength of a spot weld under high strain rate loading (right).

CAVS Extension currently has the capability to perform resistance spot welding experiments (left).