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Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849

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Numerical simulation of laser full penetration welding

Komeil Kazemi a, John A. Goldak b,*
a
Department of Automotive Engineering, Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST), Narmak, Tehran, Iran
b
Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Received 18 April 2007; received in revised form 18 June 2007; accepted 4 January 2008
Available online 23 October 2008

Abstract

A three dimensional finite element model has been developed to dynamically simulate the laser full penetration welding process. The
parametric design capabilities of the finite element code ANSYS (revision 5.4) were employed for this purpose. The model calculates the
transient temperature profile and the dimensions of the fusion zone during the welding process. The heat source was parameterized by the
combination of a circular disk source with a Gaussian distribution of thermal flux with center on the top surface and a line source
through the thickness of workpiece. The strength of the line source was calculated as a function of Peclet number and conductivity with
the assumption of a conical profile of the keyhole. Various values of conductivity were examined for different welding speeds, to obtain
the best agreement between the model and experiments. The results suggest that for different welding speeds, an effective conductivity for
material must be used to predict the weld cross section. They also show that the weld shape is a strong function of Peclet number and
conductivity of material. For this reason, it is essential to incorporate an accurate description of heat source.
Ó 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Laser full penetration welding; Keyhole; Effective conductivity; Peclet number; Weld dimensions

1. Introduction stresses, residual stresses and distortion. However this sim-

Laser beam welding is a highly efficient and precise
welding method that is being increasingly used in industrial
manufacturing and is of growing importance in industry.
Compared to other welding processes it offers the advan-
tage of very low heat input to the weld, resulting in low
distortion in components.
Modeling and simulation of the laser beam welding pro-
cess has proven to be highly efficient for research, design
development and production engineering. In comparison
with experimental studies, a modeling study can give
detailed information concerning the characteristics of weld
pool and their relationship with the welding process
parameters (welding speed, laser beam intensity, workpiece
thickness, etc) and can be used to reduce the costs of exper-
iments. A simulation of the laser welding process enables
estimation of weld pool geometry, transient temperature,
*
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: jgoldak@mrco2.carleton.ca (J.A. Goldak).
ulation is not an easy task since it involves the interaction
of thermal, mechanical and metallurgical phenomena.
Understanding the heat process of welding is important
for the analysis of welding structure, mechanics, micro-
structure and controlling weld quality.
Several analytical and numerical models have been pro-
posed to understand the temperature fields, weld pool
geometry and keyhole profile. The simplest model that sim-
ulates the shape and size of weld pool is based on the linear
heat conduction model of Rosenthal [1]. We start from the
work of Rosenthal, Swift-Hook and Gick [2] analytically
who modeled continuous laser welding assuming heat
transfer by conduction only. The beam was represented
as a moving line source with full penetration under all
welding conditions. They were able to estimate the weld
dimensions as a function of laser power and beam velocity
relative to the workpiece.
Klemens [3] calculated the keyhole shape considering a
plasma-filled keyhole, which is held open by a balance
between vapor pressure within the keyhole, surface tension

0927-0256/$ - see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.commatsci.2008.01.002
842 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849

and hydrodynamic pressure in the molten region surround- absorbed by the workpiece can be calculated as a function
ing the keyhole. of the Peclet number, thermal conductivity and the pene-
Mazumder and Steen [4] developed the first numerical tration depth from the measured temperature field. Lankal-
model of the continuous laser welding process. This model apalli et al. [9] calculated the power absorbed per unit
implements a finite difference technique for a Gaussian depth of the workpiece which is the basis for the line source
beam intensity distribution. The absorptivity of the laser strength introduced in present work.
radiation is considered to be 100% when the temperature Consider the quasi-steady state in an Eulerian formula-
exceeds the boiling point. Kaplan [5] predicted the asym- tion for the purpose of computing the heat source param-
metry of the keyhole by considering the different rates of eters, in which a cylindrical surface of radius a, at uniform
heat transfer in different regions of the keyhole. temperature, TV moves with a constant speed, along the x
In recent years, Sudnik [6] developed a model to simu- direction, in an infinite medium initially at a constant tem-
late the effect of the gap width on the formation of weld perature, T0. It is assumed that the workpiece is in steady
pool surface in butt and overlap joints. The gap width motion parallel to the x-axis with velocity (v, o, o) and all
was assumed to be sufficiently small relative to the focus the material parameters are constant. The governing differ-
diameter. In other work Sudnik [7] proposed a numerical ential equations and boundary conditions for the tempera-
model in order to gain a better understanding of the struc- ture distribution are
ture of the heat transport in the weld pool. The different
modes of transport such as heat conduction, fluid flow, o2 T o2 T v oT
þ þ ¼0 ð1Þ
and weld convexity are compared with respect to their con- ox2 oy 2 j ox
tribution to the weld pool geometry. Although a critical
review of the previous work indicates that the models have T ¼ TV at x2 þ y 2 ¼ a2 ; T ðx; yÞ ¼ T 0 as x; y ! 1:
provided significant insight into the welding process and
welded materials, they are not widely used in designing In which, v is the welding speed and j is the thermal diffu-
and manufacturing today [8]. sivity of material. The closed form solution of the above
Since many complicated factors are involved, especially equation in polar coordinate is (Carslaw and Jager 1962)
those associated with weld pool dynamics, metal evapora- [10]
tion, plasma formation, absorption mechanism in the key-
hole, and interaction between laser beam and plasma TV  T
¼ 1  exp ðPe r cos hÞ
plume, modeling of laser keyhole welding is challenging. TV  T0
Moreover, sometimes a simple model is needed to describe X1
I n ðPeÞ
 en K n ðPe r Þ cos ðnhÞ ð2Þ
the temperature field. Especially, if the primary goal is K n ðPeÞ
0
computing the thermal stress during the welding process.
In this regard, in the present work, a very simple three va
where Pe ¼ 2j is the Peclet number, r ¼ ar is the normalized
dimensional finite element model for laser full penetration radial coordinate, for n = 0 en = 1 and for n P 1 en = 2 and
welding has been developed. The laser beam is parameter- In and Kn are the modified Bessel functions of first and sec-
ized by the combination of a Gaussian distribution of ond type, of order n, respectively. Using the Fourier law
thermal flux in a circular disk source on the surface and the power absorbed per unit depth will be
a line heat source in the thickness direction of the work-
Z 2p
piece. These heat sources move with a constant speed. oT
For this purpose a heat source model was developed using Pz ¼ k j a dh ð3Þ
0 or r¼a
quasi-steady state Eulerian formulation to estimate the
heat source parameters. Then these heat source parameters where k is the thermal conductivity of the material. Lankal-
were applied to a Lagrangian FE transient thermal analysis apalli has evaluated the integral in the above equation
to compute the temperature field. This model is capable of numerically for Pe in the range of 0–5 and gave the follow-
calculating the fusion zone geometry. As mentioned the ing empirical equation
complicated fluid flow in liquid metal and in the plasma
P z ¼ k ðT V  T 0 Þ ð2:1995 þ 6:2962 Pe  0:4994 Pe2
was ignored. Also it was assumed that the latent heat of
fusion does not play a major role in determining such þ 0:0461 Pe3 Þ ð4Þ
things as the weld width.
As will be mentioned later, a modified form of this equa-
2. The theoretical description tion is used to estimate the line source strength used for a
Lagrangian FE model.
In deep penetration laser welding, when the laser beam
intensity is comparatively high, the welded material can 3. Finite element modeling
be heated to the extent that there is intensive vaporization
from the weld pool surface, leading to formation of a key- A schematic representation of the LBW process and
hole. It was known that in this mode, the laser power dimension of the model is shown in Fig. 1. Because of
 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849 843

Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the LBW process and dimensions of

the plate.

Fig. 3. Thermal conductivity (Wm1 °C1) and specific heat (J kg1 °C1)
as a function of temperature (°C).

has been used for temperatures above the melting point.

This value is assumed to be adjustable parameter and its
value will be determined as a function of welding speed.
This value is a material property for the software.

3.2. Heat source strength

The superposition of a line and point sources can pro-

vide a satisfactory description of a keyhole weld. A line
source model in which the power density is constant per
unit length of line, by itself could lead to only a parallel
sided weld, while a point source model would lead to a
weld that is approximately semi circular in cross section
Fig. 2. Mesh of the model and the weld area. [12]. So, firstly it’s necessary to construct the proper heat
source model to describe the weld shape.
the symmetry of the geometry and loads, only one of the In Fig. 4 a simple schematic of a ‘‘nail head” shape of
two welded plates was modeled. the cross section in the case of keyhole mode is shown
As shown in Fig. 2, a dense mesh was used in part 1 which can be obtained by employing a circular disk flux
along the weld line. In order to reduce the calculation time
a coarser mesh was adopted for part 3. These two parts
were connected part 2 that was meshed with tetrahedral
elements. Two types of elements were used for meshing
the model. The 8-node hexahedral element, SOLID70,
was used for parts 1 and 3 and the 10-node tetrahedral ele-
ment, SOLID87, for the connecting region. The model has
the capability to be changed by the simple change of vari-
ous parameters including dimension, material property and
operational parameter such as welding speed in order to
simulate different welding conditions.

3.1. Material properties

The material considered is AISI304 steel and thermal

material properties such as thermal conductivity and spe-
cific heat are assumed to be temperature dependent
(Fig. 3), while a constant density (q = 7900 kgm3) was Fig. 4. Nail head shape of weld cross section and assumption of conical
assumed [11]. As shown a greater value for the conductivity keyhole.
844 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849

source and a line source of constant power per unit length The power absorbed in each element in the FE model
of line. A laser heat source to simulate a laser generated can be calculated from
keyhole can be either partially or fully penetrating and Z z2
either constant or varying in strength with depth. P element ¼ P z dz ð11Þ
z1

3.2.1. Strength of the circular disk source This is the power, that is absorbed by each element
The heat flux on the top surface is assumed to have a along the thickness in FE model and this power is con-
Gaussian distribution in a circular disk of radius rf and ducted to the workpiece through the side faces of 8 ele-
given as ments along the thickness except the side on the adiabatic
! plane. In Eq. (8) it is obvious that in the case of full pene-
r2
Iðx; yÞ ¼ g I 0 exp 2 2 ð5Þ tration, d will be the thickness of the plate.
rf

In which, I0 = Pi/prf 2 and the absorption coefficient, g is 3.2.3. Power absorbed by circular disk and line source
measured from Bramson’s formula [13] Calculating the total power used for simulation is
 1=2    3=2 straightforward. The fraction of the total incident power
R R R Pi absorbed by the circular disk source is assumed to be
gðT Þ ¼ :365  0:0667 þ :006 ð6Þ
k k k
P c ¼ gP i ð12Þ
where k is the wavelength of the laser beam, and R is the
where g is the absorption coefficient from Eq. (6).
electrical resistivity of the material. The average electrical
The power absorbed by the line source is determined by
resistivity of 304 stainless steel is 80 lX cm [13]. Substitut-
integrating the power absorbed in each element as follows:
ing these values into Eq. (6). The absorption coefficients are Z t
obtained as 0.27 for Nd:YAG laser (k = 1.06 lm) and .095
Pl ¼ P z dz ð13Þ
for CO2 laser (k = 10.6 lm). 0

3.2.2. Strength of the line source Where t is the plate thickness and Pz is from Eq. (9). Using
The empirical Eq. (4) was adopted to estimate the Eq. (8) and changing the variable of integration we have
strength of the line source with the assumption of a conical t
dz ¼  dPe ð14Þ
keyhole (Fig. 4). Simply we have Peð0Þ
 z Z Peð0Þ
rk ¼ r0 k 1  ð7Þ t keffe ðT V  T 0 Þ
d Pl ¼ P z dPe ð15Þ
Peð0Þ 0
where r0k is the keyhole radius on the top surface, d is the
penetration depth and z is the distance from top surface. As P l ¼ t keffe ðT V  T 0 Þð2:1995 þ 3:1481 Peð0Þ
the Peclet number is Pe ¼ vr2jk , we can write the Peclet num- 2
 0:16647Peð0Þ þ 0:01152Peð0Þ
3
ð16Þ
ber for any depth as a function of z, Peclet number at the
top surface of workpiece, and the maximum penetration as From Eqs. (12) and (16) the total power absorbed by the
below workpiece is the sum of the power from circular disk source
 z and from the line source and is given by Pt = Pc + Pl.
PeðzÞ ¼ Peð0Þ 1  ð8Þ
d
3.3. Determining the Peclet number
Substituting Eq. (8) into Eq. (4), we finally have
P z ¼ k ðT V  T 0 Þ ð2:1995 þ 6:2962 Pe ðzÞ To determine the value of Peclet number, Lampa and
2 3 Kaplan’s [14] work was adopted. They related the weld
 0:4994 Pe ðzÞ þ 0:0461 Pe ðzÞ Þ ð9Þ
width to the thermal diffusivity, welding speed and Peclet
Since, Pe(z) is a linear function of z, Pz is also function of z. number as follows:
This indicates that the power absorbed per unit depth de- 2j Peð0Þ
creases with depth. wt ¼ 2 ð17Þ
v
The primary results shown that a constant value for con-
ductivity in the model can not give good results for weld This equation primarily was used to measure the weld
bead shape as welding speed increases. Therefore, instead width at the top surface. If we have the weld width from
of using the constant value of thermal conductivity for each experiments, it would be reasonable that we are able to esti-
welding speed, an effective value is defined such that its value mate Pe(0). Lampa et al. assumed the value 2.5 times the
is a times of the conductivity of the liquid metal as follows: value of conductivity of material to artificially account
for heat transfer by fluid flow in the liquid and plasma.
keffe ¼ a kliq ð10Þ
In this work three cases were examined and the Peclet
This value is substituted for k in Eq. (9). It should be men- number was calculated with j1 = jliquid (case A) and j2 =
tioned that a is a user defined coefficient. 2.5jliquid case (B) and j3 = 6.25jliquid case (C) from Eq. (17).
 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849 845

According to Dowden [12], the value of 2.13  105 m2 s1
for diffusivity of liquid metal was adopted.
3.4. Time stepping
The heat source, which was defined in a local coordinate
system moves with time. When the heat source moves to
the next load step, the former load step is deleted. The time,
which the heat source is applied in each load step, is t = l/v,
where l is element length and is equal to 0.1 mm and v is the
welding speed. After the first load step, the heat source
moves forward to the next position in a distance of
0.1 mm. Since the length of the plate is 10 mm the welding
process requires 100 steps.

Table 1
Input data used for calculations (Figs. 5–8) 4. Modeling results
Property/parameter Value
Density, q 7900 kg m3
In the next step the thermal analysis was conducted. The
Thermal conductivity of liquid, kliq 32.7 Wm1 °C1 input data used for analysis were listed in Table 1. Fig. 5
Effective thermal conductivity of liquid, keffe 49 Wm1 °C1 shows the temperature distribution in the welding parts
Initial temperature, T0 25 °C at four different times during the welding process. Fig. 6
Laser input power, Pi 5500 W shows temperature histories for some nodes placed trans-
Welding speed, v 32.9 ms1
Average beam radius, rf 0.35 mm
versally to the weld direction. From this figure the severe
Power absorbed by circular disk source, Pc 522 W temperature gradient during the heating analysis can be
Power absorbed by line source, Pl 1814 W clearly noted.
Fraction of laser input power absorbed by 2336 W In the results, the contour for the boiling point of the
workpiece, Pt alloy (=2700 °C) defines the keyhole boundary whereas
Peclet number at the top surface, Pe(0) 0.408
the region between the boiling point and melting tempera-

Fig. 5. Temperature distribution during welding and cooling phase, time (s).
846 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849
ture (=1450 °C) indicates the weld pool geometry (Figs. 7
and 8)
Moreover, the weld pool shape varies through the thick-
ness due to the three dimensional character of the transient
thermal field calculation (Fig. 8). This is very similar to the
weld pool shape presented by Sudink [7] in which the con-
tribution of transport such as the contribution of conduc-
tivity, fluid flow, and the weld pool convexity in the weld
pool shape was taken into account. As seen in Fig. 8, the
front wall of the keyhole is more inclined than the rear
wall.
Fig. 6. Calculated temperature histories for nodes A, B, C, transverse to
the weld direction.
Fig. 7. Weld pool geometry (a), weld pool isotherms, top view (b) and weld cross section (c).
Fig. 8. Weld pool and keyhole geometry, side view.
4.1. Examining the heat source model
To assess the performance of the model the data of weld
cross sections from the work of Binda was used [15], Four
weld cross sections of laser welds associated with different
welding speed are shown in Fig. 9. They were used to deter-
mine the value of Peclet number used in the heat source
model.
Case B was chosen as a reference case. For each welding
speed various values for thermal conductivity were exam-
ined and the value which gives the best predicted weld cross
section was chosen. It should be noted that in the cases A
and B and C the same power is absorbed by the workpiece.
For example in case C with the smaller Peclet number, the
value of thermal conductivity varies in such way that the
power absorbed by the workpiece in case C is equal to
the power absorbed in cases A and B. The weld cross sec-
tions obtained from the simulation with their related con-
ductivity and Peclet number values are shown in Fig. 10.
 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849 847

v 4 = 47 mm s v 3 = 42.3 mm s v2 = 37.6 mm s v1 = 32.9 mm s

Wt = 1.98 mm Wt = 2.03 mm Wt = 2.35 mm Wt = 2.64 mm

Fig. 9. Bead profile (material: steel 304; thickness: 4 mm; laser power: 5.5 KW CO2; focal height: 0).

Pe ( 0) = 1.08 Pe ( 0) = 1.01 Pe (0) = 1.04 Pe (0) = 1.02

1 1 1 C 1 1
effe = 42.5 W m C effe = 39.9 W m
1
C 1
effe = 37.6 W m effe = 32.4 W m C 1

Pe ( 0 ) = .437 Pe (0) = .403 Pe (0) = .415 Pe ( 0 ) = .408

1 1 1 C 1 1 1 1
effe = 65.4 W m C effe = 60.5 W m effe = 57.2 W m C effe = 49 W m C 1

Pe (0) = .175 Pe (0) = .161 Pe (0) = .166 Pe (0) = .163

1 1 1 1 1 1 1
effe = 84.3 W m C effe = 77 W m C effe = 73.2 W m C effe = 62.4 W m C 1

Pt = 3002 W Pt = 2750 W Pt = 2651W Pt = 2336 W

Fig. 10. Weld cross section from simulation, case A (second row), case B (third row), case C (forth row).
848 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849

The results suggest that with increasing welding speed, a

greater value for thermal conductivity must be chosen in
order to obtain an acceptable cross section; otherwise,
the weld bead will be too narrow. The relation between
the travel speed and effective conductivity is shown in
Fig. 11.
The weld pool length for cases A and B and C is shown
in Fig. 12. The simulation suggests that the weld pool
length almost remains constant while welding speed Fig. 13. Effect of the Peclet number on the weld pool length and the weld
increases. This is in agreement with results presented by cross section (v = 32.9 mm/s).
Sudnik [7]. He states that with constant laser power, the
weld pool length as a function of the welding speed varies
only slightly. pool is obtained. This result is expected because the power
From Fig. 10 it can be concluded that the Peclet number absorbed by workpiece in cases A and B and C is the same;
determines whether the weld is rectangular or triangular in therefore according to the law of energy conservation the
shape. Fig. 13 shows the effect of Peclet number on weld volume of the weld pool must be equal for three cases.
shape. As the Peclet number increases the weld cross sec-
tion deforms away from rectangular toward a triangular 4.2. Final validation of the model
and also longer weld pool is resulted. As shown in
Fig. 13, while the cross section is triangle the longer weld It is reasonable to expect that by using the information
in Fig. 11 we are able to estimate another weld cross section
with a different velocity. To validate this assumption, the
90 laser weld cross section in a 3 mm plate was chosen from
[6], which is shown in Fig. 14.
effective thermal conductivity w/m.C

80 case A For Nd:YAG laser the value of the absorption coeffi-

70 case B cient for steel 304 is calculated to be about 0.27. From
60 case C Fig. 14, since the weld is almost rectangular in shape, in
50
the upper curve in Fig. 11 the effective conductivity corre-
sponding to 15 mm/s is about 36 Wm1 °C1. This value is
40 used for determining the strength of line source. The weld
30 width at the top is 1.75 mm, using Lampa and Kaplan’s
20 experimental equation the value of the Peclet number for
determining the line source strength is 0.049. These param-
10 eters give the value of 1138 W for the total power absorbed
0 by the line and the circular disk source.
0 10 20 30 40 50 In Fig. 15, the cross section from the simulation has
welding velocity (mm/s) been compared to cross section from the experiment. As
Fig. 11. Variation of effective conductivity with welding velocity. shown the simulation results give a good estimate of the
weld cross section. The weld width in six cross sections
along with the thickness was compared to experimental
8 weld width which gives an average error of 9% in predic-
tion. As shown the major error is in the depth near the
top surface. This can be easily improved by defining the
7 value of absorption for the elements near the top surface.
For extending this 3-D modeling, one could use the data
weld pool length (mm)

6 of the weld cross section from experiment for defining the

absorption coefficient for each element along the thickness.
So an absorption profile could be obtained as a function of
5

Laser power 1700 W

4 material steel 304 L
thickness 3 mm
case A case B case C
Welding speed 15 mm s
3
25 30 35 40 45 50
Laser type Nd : YAG
welding velocity (mm/s)
Fig. 12. Weld pool length dependence on the welding speed (simulation). Fig. 14. Bead profile for final validation [16].
 K. Kazemi, J.A. Goldak / Computational Materials Science 44 (2009) 841–849 849

It was found that three of the most sensitive parameters

to the model in predicting weld shape are Peclet number,
the conductivity of material and absorption coefficient of
material used for the circular disk source.
The Peclet number of the heat source model determines,
whether the weld cross section is triangular or rectangular.
Increasing the Peclet number deforms the cross section
away from rectangular toward a triangular.

References
Fig. 15. Comparison of the predicted weld geometry to the experiment
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