Journal of Materials Processing Tech.

255 (2018) 121–128

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Materials Processing Tech.

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jmatprotec

Counter rotating twin-tool system in friction stir welding process: A T

simulation study
⁎
Rahul Jaina, Kanchan Kumaria, Surjya K. Pala, , Shiv B. Singhb
a
Friction stir welding Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, 721 302, India
b
Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology. Kharagpur, 721 302, India

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: In the current paper a comparative study between twin-tool and conventional friction stir welding tool by using a
Twin-tool numerical method is carried out based on temperature distribution, strain, material flow and material velocity.
Lagrangian method The model is validated with experimentally measured temperature for both the cases and a good correlation is
Friction stir welding observed. Twin-tool generates higher maximum and minimum temperatures over the conventional FSW having a
Temperature distribution
single-tool. Lower thermal gradients along transverse and thickness directions are achieved for twin-tool as
Deform 3D
compared to the conventional FSW. In twin-tool, strain distribution is symmetric contrary to the asymmetry in
Material flow
conventional FSW. Material deposition is closer to its original location in case of twin-tool as compared to
conventional FSW leading to lower chances of defects in the former.

1. Introduction challenge. Also, changes in metallurgical and mechanical properties

Friction stir welding (FSW) is one of the fastest emerging welding
techniques since its inception in 1991 (Thomas et al., 1991). FSW
possesses several advantages over fusion welding techniques like higher
mechanical strength, no defects related to re-solidification, no use of
consumables or shielding gas (Jain et al., 2015). Certain defects like
worm hole, lack of penetration, kissing bond etc. are reported during
FSW due to improper selection of process parameters (Kim et al., 2006).
Multi-pass FSW is one of the methods to eliminate the defects. (Brown
et al., 2009) have studied the effect of multi-pass (five passes) friction
stir welding (MP-FSW) on metallurgical and mechanical properties.
They reported reduction of 7% in tensile strength from pass 1–5. Peak
residual stress is also reduced with increase in number of pass while
there is negligible change in microstructure of nugget zone. (Jie and Jie,
2009) eliminated the groove defect by re-welding. They compared the
symmetrical and offset re-welding and found that the latter produces
higher strength as compared to the former. In order to produce uniform
microstructure, welding direction is reversed during re-welding.
(Nakata et al., 2006) carried out MP-FSP to improve the mechanical
properties of the sample. They achieved 70% and 22.2% higher
strength and hardness, respectively, for MP-FSP as compared to the
base metal. Removal of cold flake from the base metal and refinement
of microstructure are reasons for improved mechanical properties.
Hence, multi-pass/re-welding can be used for elimination of defects and
grain refinement, but selection of process parameter for MP-FSW is a
with respect to base material are an area of concern. To overcome the
difficulty, the welding institute, Cambridge developed a tandem twin-
stir, a variant of FSW having two inline tools, rotating in either same or
opposite direction (Thomas et al., 2005). It has several advantages over
conventional FSW viz. two counter rotating tool will nullify the forces,
lesser clamping force, lower torque, significant reduction of defects etc.
(Thomas et al., 2005). (Kumari et al., 2015) have indigenously fabri-
cated a twin-tool setup and compared twin-tool FSW (TT-FSW) with
dual-pass single tool FSW in terms of mechanical properties viz. hard-
ness, weld strength, % elongation. Higher hardness is reported for TT-
FSW at a rotational speed of 1800 rpm and defect-free weld is achieved
at a higher welding speed of 63 mm/min.
Modeling of TT-FSW is essential to understand the mechanism of
heat generation, temperature distribution, forces, power, material flow
etc., but till date no literature is available in open source. A few notable
work for modeling conventional FSW are discussed. (Jain et al., 2016)
developed a three dimensional model to simulate FSW based on La-
grangian method in DEFORM-3D. They compared two pin profiles
(cylindrical and conical) in terms of force generated and material ve-
locity. Conical pin generates higher material flow in vertical direction
as compared to cylindrical pin. They have also shown the asymmetric
distribution of plastic strain with higher strain on advancing side (AS)
as compared to the retreating side (RS) (Jain et al., 2017a, 2014).
(Tutunchilar et al., 2012) simulated material flow for cylindrical pin
based on the Lagrangian method. Temperature evolution and axial

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: skpal@mech.iitkgp.ernet.in (S.K. Pal).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmatprotec.2017.11.043
Received 5 November 2017; Received in revised form 21 November 2017; Accepted 23 November 2017
Available online 24 November 2017
0924-0136/ © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
R. Jain et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128

force were used to validate the developed model. They predicted the
size of stirred zone by using particle tracking method. (Trimble et al.,
2012) predicted axial force and torque through FEM model and vali-
dated it with experimental results. The Lagrangian formulation was
used with Johnson-Cook material model and sticking friction condition.
They compared between smooth and threaded cylindrical pins and
found that the latter generates lesser force and higher deformation.
(Zhang and Zhang, 2009) developed a 3D model in ABAQUS/Explicit to
study the effect of welding speed in FSW. To achieve better con-
vergence, pin height is taken larger than the workpiece thickness. Mass
scaling of 107 was defined to reduce computational time. Void was
predicted at a higher welding velocity of 4 mm/s.
A good amount of literature is available for modeling of conven-
tional FSW welding by using single tool, but no literature is available on
numerical modeling of FSW by using twin-tool, and its comparison with
single tool (ST) FSW. Therefore, the current work focuses on the de-
velopment of three-dimensional, thermo-mechanical model to simulate
TT-FSW based on the Lagrangian method. Model predicted tempera-
ture, strain, axial force, power and material flow are studied and
compared with ST-FSW. Model is validated with experimentally mea-
sured temperature for both the cases.

2. Experimental procedure

A TT-FSW setup has been indigenously designed and fabricated by

the co-authors (Kumari et al., 2015). It consists of a two counter-ro-
tating tools viz. primary and secondary tools. The Former is attached
with the main spindle of the machine and rotates in counter clockwise
direction. A spur gear assembly with a gear ratio of one is used to
transmit power from the primary to the secondary tool. The twin-tool
setup is attached to knee type vertical milling machine (BFW, VF3.5) to
perform FSW experiment, as shown in Fig. 1.
To compare TT-FSW with ST-FSW, experiments have been per-
formed with the same setup by removing the gear assembly of the
secondary tool and performing ST-FSW experiment with the primary
tool only. K type thermocouple is used to capture the temperature
evolution during the experiment. Thermocouple is attached with a data
acquisition system (9211 NI card and LabVIEW software) to capture Fig. 1. (a) Experimental setup for TT-FSW (b) enlarged view of the fixtures.
and store the data. Thermocouple is embedded at a distance of 5 mm
from the edge of tool shoulder in transverse direction and at a depth of
as constant values. This assumption avoids the non-linearity and
1.5 mm from the top surface. Thermocouple was 65 mm away from the
reduces computation time.
edge of the workpiece as shown in Fig. 2.
3) The workpiece is defined as a single continuum body to avoid
A 3 mm thick AA1100 is friction stir welded using TT and ST. The
contact instabilities at the abutting edge. The tool is defined as a
workpiece has a total length and width of 150 and 75 mm, respectively.
rigid body due to negligible wear during welding of aluminum al-
For both the cases, mica sheet is used as a backing plate material to
loys.
contain the heat within the workpiece and also to avoid sticking of
aluminum alloy on the backing plate. Tool steel H13 is used to manu-
facture the tool with a cylindrical pin of 5 mm diameter and 2.6 mm pin 3.1. Geometric modeling and meshing
height. Shoulder diameter is 16 mm and plunge depth is defined as
0.1 mm. Experiments for both the cases are performed at a rotational Fig. 3 shows the meshed assembly of the workpiece, two tools and
speed of 900 rpm and 80 mm/min welding speed with a tilt angle of backing plate created for the modeling. The workpiece is defined as a
zero degree. rigid visco-plastic material i.e. elastic deformation of the material is
neglected and yield point of the material is taken as the inception of
3. Simulation details deformation. The tool and backing plate are defined as rigid materials.
138720 coupled tetrahedral elements are used to mesh the workpiece
A three-dimensional non-linear thermo-mechanically coupled tran- with biased meshing as shown in Fig. 3. Mesh size of 0.6 mm is defined
sient analysis is developed based on the Lagrangian implicit analysis. on the workpiece near the tool based on the mesh sensitivity analysis,
Simulation parameters and parts dimensions are consistent with the with a minimum element size of 1.5 with a size ratio of 2 elsewhere.
experimental data. All three stages of FSW i.e. plunging, dwelling and The tool and backing plate are meshed with 7472 and 4062 tetra-
welding are simulated. Total plunging, dweling and welding duration hedral elements respectively, having thermal degree of freedom only.
are 42, 4 and 54 s, respectively. Following assumptions are made
during the modeling to reduce computation time: 3.1.1. Re-meshing technique
FSW is a large deformation process and a strong re-meshing method
1) Dynamic recrystallization of the material and microstructural is required to avoid distortion of the mesh. Re-meshing is triggered
changes are not considered. based on element size and penetration that are defined by three dif-
2) Shear factor and mechanical properties of the material are defined ferent criteria as discussed below:

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R. Jain et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128

Fig. 2. Schematic of TT-FSW setup and thermocouple location.

(a) Based on element penetration: It is defined that re-meshing initiates Table 1

once the ratio of the distance from middle of the edge to tool sur- Material constant for Sheppard and Wright model (Sheppard and Jackson, 1997).
face with size of the element reaches 0.7 (DEFORM, 2015).
ln A (s−1) α (MPa−1) n ΔH (J/mol) R (J/mol/°C)
(b) Shrinking of element: In this criterion, re-meshing initiates when
the size of the element has shrunk by 40%. In this case, element size 24.67 0.045 5.66 158 300 8.314
is 0.6; therefore, if element size reduces below 0.24 mm re-meshing
is initiated.
(c) Stretching of element: In this criterion re-meshing initiates once the Table 2
Mechanical properties of the workpiece and tool material and heat transfer coefficients
element size has stretched by 60% i.e. if element size increases to
(DEFORM, 2015).
0.96 mm, re-meshing is initiated.
Properties AA 1100 Tool steel
Second and third criteria are defined by using a user defined code H13
‘STRETCH·DAT’. If any of the criteria is triggered, re-meshing of the
Young’s modulus (MPa) 68900 210290
workpiece is initiated. Re-meshing is performed in two steps, firstly Poisson’s ratio 0.33 0.3
meshing the workpiece, and secondly, interpolation of data from old Thermal conductivity (N/s °C) f(T) 24.5
mesh to the new mesh based on area weighted average method Heat capacity (N/mm2 °C) f(T) 2.78
(Kobayashi et al., 1989). Heat transfer between workpiece/tool and 0.02
environment (ha) (N/mm s °C)
Heat transfer between workpiece and tool (N/mm 11
3.2. Material model s °C)
Heat transfer between workpiece bottom surface and 0.2
Sheppard and Wright material model is used to define flow stress as backing plate (hb) (N/mm s °C)
Emissivity 0.05 0.7
a function of strain-rate and temperature. It was developed based on
Arrhenius term, and is expressed in Eq. (1) (Sheppard and Wright,
1979). Isotropic hardening rule is defined along with von-Mises’ yield Table 3
function to capture the effect of work hardening. Temperature dependent thermal properties of AA1100.

−ΔH Temperature (°C) 37.8 93.3 148.9 204.4 260 315.6 371.1 426.7
ε̇ = A[sinh(ασ)]n exp ⎛ ⎞
⎝ RT ⎠ (1)
Thermal conductivity 162 177 184 192 201 207 217 223
where, ε̇ = σ, ΔH,R,T are effective strain-rate, effective flow stress, ac- Heat capacity 2.55 2.64 2.71 2.77 2.84 2.91 2.98 3.05
tivation energy, gas constant and temperature, respectively. A,α and n
are the material constants. Mechanical properties of the workpiece, tool
material and material constant related to Eq. (1) are given in Table 1
and 2, respectively. The Maximum temperature in FSW rises upto 0.8-
0.9*Tm (Tm is melting point of material in °C); and variation in density
of AA1100 for the said range is merely 3%. Therefore, density is defined
as a constant value but other thermal parameters like thermal

Fig. 3. Meshed assembly of TT-FSW model.

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R. Jain et al.
conductivity and volumetric heat capacity are defined as a function of
temperature (Biswas and Mandal, 2011), as shown in Table 3.
3.3. Boundary and friction conditions
Initial temperature of the workpiece and tool is set at 28 °C.
Following are the boundary conditions defined in the model: (a) The
workpiece side faces are constrained in X, Y and Z directions, (b) pri-
mary and secondary tools rotate about the negative and positive Z axes
respectively. (c) translational velocity for both the tool is defined in
negative Z and positive Y directions for plunging and welding, respec-
tively, (d) heat exchange between the workpiece/tool surface and en-
vironment involve convection as well as radiation as given by equation
2, (e) from the bottom face of the workpiece, heat transfer to the
backing plate occurs, as defined by Eq. (3) and same is also valid for
interaction between the tool and workpiece.
∂T
− K ∂n = σbε b (T 4 − T a4) + ha (T−Ta) (n is direction vector)
∂T
−K = hb (T−Tb)
∂z
where, K is thermal conductivity of the material, σb is the Stefan-
Boltzmann constant, ε b is emissivity of the material, Tb is ambient
temperature, and ha and hb are convective heat transfer coefficients
from the workpiece to environment and backing plate, respectively.
Shear friction model is used to define the friction condition at the
interface of the tool and workpiece as expressed in Eq. (4).
τ = mk
where, τ and k are contact frictional stress and yield shear stress of the
material, respectively. m is the shear factor which is defined as 0.4
based on the calibration carried out by the authors (Jain et al., 2016).
Further details on the model can be found in the authors’ published
work (Jain et al., 2017b).
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Temperature and strain distribution
Experimentally measured and simulation predicted temperatures
for TT-FSW and ST-FSW are compared in Fig. 4. A good correlation is
observed for both the cases. The model has accurately predicted both
the first and the second peak temperatures of TT-FSW, with an accep-
table over prediction of 4% only for the second peak temperature. In
case of TT-FSW, two peaks are observed for temperature evolution. The
first peak temperature is 335 °C and corresponds to the passage of the
primary tool, while the second peak temperature is 356 °C. Higher
temperature at the second peak is observed due to further heat
Fig. 4. Comparison of simulation predicted temperature with experiment at a rotational speed of 900 rpm and 80 mm/min velocity for (a) TT-FSW (b) ST-FSW.
Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128
generation by the secondary tool. Model has also successfully predicted
the temperature evolution for ST-FSW. Contour plots of temperature
distributions are shown in Fig. 5 after 54 s of welding for both the cases.
Maximum temperature developed for TT-FSW is 457 °C, and is 10%
higher than the maximum temperature of ST-FSW. Higher heat gen-
eration makes this method a potential candidate for welding high
strength/melting material like steel. Spread of temperature contour is
higher for TT-FSW as compared to the ST-FSW indicating softening of
material for higher duration in case of former as compared to the latter.
Minimum temperature of the workpiece for TT-FSW is 78 °C as com-
pared to 45.4 °C for ST. This indicate that the heating of the cold ma-
terial ahead of the tool is more prominent in case of TT due to heat
generation by the primary tool. Also, temperature ahead of the sec-
ondary tool is above 362 °C while for ST it is below 324 °C. This helps in
faster softening of the material and elimination of cold defects like in-
sufficient mixing etc. in case of TT-FSW (Kim et al., 2006). This could
make TT-FSW a better option for preheating of the material compared
(2) with a separate heat source (eg. plasma arc) because in case of former
stirring/joining of the material also takes place along with pre heating
of the material. Temperature distribution along the thickness direction
(3) is shown in Fig. 5(b) for both the cases. For TT-FSW, section B–B is
taken just behind the secondary tool pin as it is responsible for the final
stirring of the material. For ST-FSW, width of higher temperature on top
surface is larger than the bottom face indicating a higher generation at
the top as compared to the bottom. This is because shoulder has larger
contact area than the pin and hence former contributes to higher heat
generation. For TT-FSW, width of temperature distribution is almost
same with slightly higher on the top surface as compared with the
(4)
bottom.
Variation of temperature along the X direction is plotted in Fig. 6 to
compare the gradient of temperature distribution between TT-FSW and
ST-FSW. Temperatures for both the cases are plotted at top
(z = 2.9 mm), middle (z = 1.5 mm) and bottom plane (z = 0.1 mm).
Position of the points is similar to the section A–A and section B–B
shown in Fig. 5 (a). Variation in temperature along the thickness di-
rection is evident below the shoulder, while temperature is almost same
away from it as shown in Fig. 6. This is in-line with the results reported
in literature (Su et al., 2014). The peak temperature difference between
top and middle planes is higher as compared to that between the middle
and the bottom planes. It is because of the heat generated by plastic
deformation in the thin layer of top surface while conduction being the
only source of heat for middle and bottom surfaces. The pin also con-
tributes to the plastic heat generation, though it is negligible. It is also
evident that thermal gradient along thickness direction is lower for TT-
FSW as compared with that in the ST-FSW leading to more uniform
distribution of temperature.
The height of the dome (difference between the highest and lowest
temperature) shown in Fig. 6 for TT-FSW and ST-FSW is 93 °C and
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R. Jain et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128

Fig. 5. Contour plot of temperature distribution for TT-FSW and ST-FSW (a) Top view (b) section view.

RS for TT-FSW are lower by 31.4, 32.4 and 36.4%, respectively

Along with the temperature, plastic strain also plays a vital role on
the evolution of microstructure. Therefore, a comparison of effective
strain between ST-FSW and TT-FSW is shown in Fig. 7. Maximum strain
produced during welding with TT-FSW is 115, which is 60% higher as
compared with the deformation during ST-FSW that might lead to finer
grain size in the case of the former. Distribution of strain along thick-
ness direction is almost symmetric for TT-FSW, while it is asymmetric
for ST-FSW as shown in section B–B and A–A respectively. Asymmetry
of strain in conventional FSW is also reported in literature (Jain et al.,
2017c). Asymmetry in strain for TT-FSW can be observed behind the
primary tool, but once the counter rotating secondary tool welds the
material AS and RS are swapped leading to almost symmetric dis-
tribution of the strain.

Fig. 6. Comparison of predicted temperature between TT and ST-FSW in X-Z plane. 4.2. Material flow and velocity

Material flow behavior for both the cases is studied and the results
128 °C respectively indicating lower thermal gradient along the trans-
are shown in Fig. 8. The coordinates of the material points defined to
verse direction in case of the former as compared to the latter. This
study the material flow are 2, −30, and 0.9 i.e. on AS of the workpiece.
would lead to the lower residual stresses for TT-FSW. Also, difference in
The points are chosen on AS because defects are always generated on
temperature between AS and RS is lower for TT-FSW. At top, middle
this side of the workpiece (Kim et al., 2006). The flow behavior of the
and bottom planes, the differences in the temperature between AS and
material points is plotted in three-dimensional for ST and TT as shown

Fig. 7. Comparison of effective strain for TT and ST-FSW.

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R. Jain et al.
Fig. 8. Material flow path of material on advancing side (a) ST-FSW (b) TT-FSW (c) material flow comparison between TT-FSW and ST-FSW.
in Fig. 8 (a) and (b) respectively. ND, TD and WD axes are normal
direction i.e. along the thickness of the workpiece AA1100, transverse
direction i.e. along the width of the material and welding direction,
respectively. In the case of ST-FSW as the tool approaches the material
it initially get pushed ahead in WD and during that a slight downward
movement of the material is observed. Afterwards the material stirs
through RS before getting deposited near the centerline of the material
as shown in the projection of three dimensional graph in WD-TD plane.
Maximum displacement of the material is almost equal to the diameter
of pin (Schmidt et al., 2006). Three dimensional material flow for TT-
FSW is also plotted for the same material location as shown in Fig. 8(b).
Initial material behavior for TT-FSW is similar to ST-FSW and then the
material is further stirred by the secondary tool before finally getting
deposited. Blue color circle indicates the beginning of material flow by
secondary tool.
To elucidate the material flow behavior for both the cases, the
material points are plotted in WD-TD plane and is shown in Fig. 8(c). In
TT-FSW, material gets pushed in WD to a great extent than in ST-FSW.
This may be because of higher temperature ahead of the primary tool
which makes the material softer and increases the ease of the flow. The
final location for ST-FSW is near to the centreline of the workpiece
leading to higher chances of defect formation. In case of primary tool of
TT, material is pushed towards AS due to higher temperature and
afterwards when it gets stirred by the secondary tool, it is finally de-
posited closer to its original position leading to lower chances of defect
formation.
Evolution of the material velocity is shown in Fig. 9 (a) for three
different locations i.e. RS, CL and AS at the mid plane of the workpiece.
First and second peaks are observed due to stirring of the material with
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Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128
the primary and secondary tools, respectively. Time gap of approxi-
mately 22 s is observed between the two velocity evolutions because of
36.4 mm gap between the two tools. Higher material velocity is ob-
served for AS as compared to the RS and CL. This is in-line with the
observation reported in literature (Jain et al., 2017b). Since, counter
rotating tools are used, AS and RS get swaped for the secondary tool
and hence, the plot shows higher velocity for RS as compared with AS
for the second tool. Hotter material ahead of the secondary tool leads to
higher material velocity as compared with the primary tool. Maximum
velocity for TT-FSW is 13.5 mm/s, which makes slip rate (ratio of
material velocity to the tool velocity) for TT-FSW equal to 0.36.
Maximum velocities for ST-FSW and TT-FSW are compared and
shown in Fig. 9(b). Points have been chosen in three different planes i.e.
top, middle and bottom and at three different locations i.e. RS, CL and
AS. For TT, velocity of the secondary tool alone is considered for
comparison, because it does the final stirring of the material to form the
weld. Almost for all cases velocity for TT is higher as compared to the
ST except at the top plane on AS. For TT, maximum velocities for all
three sides are in a range of 12–13 mm/s.
4.3. Axial force and power
Evolution of axial force for the primary and secondary tools is
shown in Fig. 10(a). During initial phase of the plunging, axial forces
for both the tools are almost the same, since the material is at room
temperature. Maximum peak forces observed for primary and sec-
ondary tools are 12241 N and 8787 N, respectively. Secondary tool
generates lower peak force because of higher softening of the material
beneath it caused by heat conduction from the primary tool. Therefore,
R. Jain et al. Journal of Materials Processing Tech. 255 (2018) 121–128

Fig. 9. (a) Evolution of material velocity for twin-tool FSW (b) comparison of material velocity for TT-FSW and ST-FSW.

Fig. 10. (a) Evolution of axial force for TT-FSW (b) comparison of axial force between TT-FSW and ST-FSW.

Fig. 11. (a) Power consumption for TT (b) comparison of power consumption between TT and ST.

secondary tool could be made up of lower strength material to save the
material cost. During welding phase also the average axial force for
secondary tool is lower than primary tool, since the former is stirring
softer material as compared with the latter. Average welding forces for
secondary and primary tools are 4745 and 3842 N, respectively. Com-
parison of axial force generated during ST and TT-FSW is shown in
Fig. 10(b). Resultant axial force for TT is calculated by addition of
forces developed by the primary and secondary tool. Maximum force
observed for ST is 13272 N. Time difference between peak force of ST
and TT is approximately 9 s. It is because the experiments are carried
out in the vertical milling machine and plunging is done by manually
rotating the wheel and the simulation time is consistent with the
experiment. Though there is a considerable difference in the peak axial
force for ST and TT but average welding forces for both are comparable.
Average welding forces for the ST and TT are 8293 and 8588 N, re-
spectively. This is mainly due to the higher temperature ahead of the
primary and secondary tool as compared to the ST-FSW. Power con-
sumption for TT-FSW is shown in Fig. 11(a). Power consumption gra-
dually increases during the plunging of the tool and attains a peak at
41 s which is close to plunging duration (42 s); afterwards a sudden
drop in power is observed because of softening of the material due to
shoulder contact. Finally, uniform power is required for welding phase.
Peak power for the primary and secondary tool is predicted as 814 and
731 W, respectively. While average power during welding for primary

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R. Jain et al.
and secondary tools is 426 and 361 W, respectively. Similar to the axial
force, peak power is lower for the secondary tool as compared with the
primary tool.
Comparison of power consumption between TT and ST is shown in
Fig. 11(b). Peak power required for ST is 747 W, which is half of the
requirement of TT. While average power requirement for ST is 476 W.
5. Conclusions
A three-dimensional thermo-mechanical model is used to compare
the twin-tool with conventional FSW process. The developed model is
validated with experimentally measured temperature for twin-tool and
single tool friction stir welding processes, and a good co-relation is
observed. Twin-tool has been compared with conventional FSW in
terms of temperature, strain, velocity, axial force and power.
Followings are the major outcome of the current research work:
(1) The peak temperature is 10% higher and the minimum temperature
is 72% higher in the case of TT-FSW than in ST-FSW. Temperature
distribution for twin-tool is more uniform in thickness and trans-
verse directions.
(2) Higher deformation is observed for TT-FSW as compared with ST.
Strain distribution is more symmetric for the former.
(3) Material from advancing side is deposited closer to its initial loca-
tion for twin-tool leading to lower chances of defect generation.
Secondary tool produces higher material velocity as compared to
that of the primary tool, and also higher material velocity is ob-
served for TT-FSW.
(4) Maximum values of axial force and average power are predicted
higher in case of TT-FSW.
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