In} Adv Macuf Technol (2017) 92:1243-1253 OL 16,1007500170-017-0187-3 ORIGINAL ARTICLE A numerical approach to the energy efficiency of laser welding G. Pastras" «A, Fysikopoulos™ + G, Cheyssotouris" Received: 12 October 2016 /Acceped: 20 February 2017 Published oslne: 9 March 2017 Abstract The industrial sector is increasingly concerned with consumption, due to the cavironmental burden and wased cost. An action plan requires the study of energy oflicioncy in manufacturing processes, especially encrgy- imteasive processes. Tae energy consumption, curing the as- sembly, plays a significant rale on the product's final energy and eco-evaluation. In this paper, there is a presentation of an in-depth study of the energy elliciency of joining processes, The laser welding process is also discussed in detail, since it thas been an increasingly indispensable part of competitive ‘manufacturing throughout the world, and itis a thermal pro- vess with relatively low energy efficiency. Important out- comes, regarding the dependeace of energy efficiency and weld pool geometry oa process parameters, have been derived. Keywords Energy efficiency - Laser welding - Weld pool geometry - Joining process - Sustainable manufacturing. 1 Introduction Laser processing has been an increasingly indispensable part of competitive manufacturing throughout the world [1-5]. IG. Chryssolouis aol @ ms ech upacas se Laboratory for Manvficturing Systems and Automation, Deparment of Mechanic! Ergineeing and Aerorautis, University of Pata, 226500 Pars, Greece Department of Physics, Scio! of Applied Mateus and Paysicl Sciences, Nationa Technical University, 15780 Athons, Greece Automation Sysenss- Materials & Process Technologies, COMAU SpA, Via Rivals 49, 10095 Grughasco, TO. Iuly The Author(s) 2077 this ancl is pubtished with open access at Sprngeink com Specifically, laser welding (LW) [6, 7] has been widely used in the automotive, aerospace, electronics, and heavy ‘manufacturing inéusties to join a varity of materials, In the last fow yoars, 2 new lascr process, the romote laser welding (RLW) has emerged. RLW (8, 9] has becn devsloped and implemented to improve the productivity and Mlexibility of conventional LW. In the automotive industry, high-power le- sets are used for welding many componenis, such as transmris- sions, catalytic converters, exhaust systems, closures, and tailoz-welded blanks (10, 11) ‘Manufacturing the products of the future by inconporating economic, social, and environmental sustainability is a major challenge for today’s manufacturing industry. The need to- wards sustainable manufacturing fas been more inminent than ever before. State regulations, along with the increasing energy prices, exert a new pressure on manufacturing enter prises. Thus, the industrial sector has to reduce energy cor sumption both f and environmental friendliness, in its attempt to find new flexible ways to produce “more with less” [12] and finthermore evolve fiom the strategy “maxie ‘mum gain from minimum capital” to “maximum gain from ‘minimum resources” [13]. The investigation of the manufacturing processes, from an exergy point of view, indicates that only a small action of the energy input actuelly adds value to the final product [14] and an amount of 20-40% of the energy used in industry is of no added valve [15]. Furthermore, the largest amount of energy is ‘used for the creation of stabie process conditions and peripk- eral functions [16, 17). ‘Although the energy spent on the process itself is a small percentage of the overall energy consumption [19], the recent ly developed systematic approaches for the improvement of | energy efficiency in manufacturing systems [18] show that process models, focusing on the provess itself, along with the specific nnsumption and theie Dspringe1244 Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2017) 9212431253 dependence on the process variables, are required for the re alization ofa holistic approach. For the optimization of energy officeney, the determination of a large set of process param- ters ig required. The study of the processes is considered necessary for a number of reasons [14, 18} + The study of the processes provides the deeper possibie understanding of the energy transformations that take place during the manufacturing process. + Simple analytical models that lead to qualitaive and quan- titative results, adaptable to a wide range of applications, may be applied. + Although the energy spent at process level is minor, an tion of process variables may also alter cof machine peripherals that correspond to a larger percentage of energy consumption. As an ex- ample, the consumption ofa cooling unit depends on the processing speed [16]. + Processing time is function of the process variables, Thus, the selection of appropriate process parameters las consequences for bath the machine peripherals’ consump- tions (mechine level) end the production planning (line and factory levels). + Non-conventional processes, allowing space for signi cantenergy gains at process level, have not been adequate- ly studied, The above points clarify the fact that a complese anal- sis, addressing the problem of energy efficiency maxi= ‘mization, requires process modelling, focusing on the ene ergy efficiency, not only through the description of the energy consumption at process level, as a funetion of the process variables, but also of other process aspects, such as the processing time, However, this subject as limited presence in literature [14] especial conventional processes (20]. Indicatively, regarding th conventional process, Dreganeseu etal. [21] have related the use of experiments, machine tol ellicieney, specific consumed enerpy, and consumed enerpy 10 several ma chining variables of a milling process. Fysikopoulos etal [22] studied the laser drilling and grooving process feom an energy elliciency point of view, having neglected all other parameters and focused only on the interaction of laser beam with the material. Pastras et al, [20) have presented an analytical and numerical approach of evap- oration laser drilling, cowards the theoretical specification of the process parameters that maximize energy oficieney Regarding the LW process, a numberof studies, attempting to model different welding states and various configurations, such as lap or but welding, using ether analytical [23, 24), sni-empirical, or empirical methods 2: Fied out, However, none of the above deal with the energy 27], have been ear- D springer efficiency of the laser welding process, In this paper, the LW process will be investigated under the prism of energy elf ciency, along with important weld geometry key performance indicators (KPIs). This will be realized with the use of the numerical mode! previously developed by Pestra etal. [28] 2 The numerical model for keyhole LW modelling This numerical model [28] takes into eccount the physics of both heat conduction and phase transitions during the process, as well as Taser defocusing, while it neglects plasma formation and multiple reflections of the laser beam in the keyhole walls, The mogel’s basic simplifying assumption is a static approach to the process; instead of a moving laser head performing a stitch, the laser head is ed being stationary, but it is “on” only for as ye as the laser interacts with a given point, at the center of the by the scanning spoed ‘The method's mathematics is a combination of finite differences, the enthalpy method, and “life and death of element's” techniques from the finite element method. Specifically, cylindrical coordinates are adopied to take advantage of the problem's rotational symmetry, while radius, depth, and time are considered discretized, as in finite difference problems. The temperature field is substituted by @ three-dimensional matrix, containing tl namely the spot diameter divided the elements Tyy, corresponding to the muterial’s ten perature at time = (i = AG radius x, = Gj — An and depth 2 = (= 14: In onter for phase transitions to be taken into account, another field, corresponding to the enthalpy density iy intro- duced. This field has to be connected to the temperature, in such a way’ so.as for the latent heats of fasion and evaporation to be taken into account. Specifically, “ Fy Tn << Uy r we ye U lett) Ty pleTy=ty) a ee) Fig. 18. Bur welding oreray’ efficiency as function of Incr power investigating eitfrent penstation depths I> 100w bee wot 423 Laser lap welding ‘Moving to the lap welding configuration, Fig. 17 prescmts the energy efficiency as a function ofthe laser power for different interface widths. The appvopriate scanning speeds can be do= termined as the crossing points of the curves in Fig. 7, with @ horizontal line comesponding to the desired intorface wid! is observed that a higher lascr power rosulls in increased ergy ellicieney. This can be attributed to the seme reasons as those in the butt welding case, Additionally, the smaller the welding interface is, the higher its energy eiliciency. In butt welding, it was true that lower penetration corresponds to higher energy efficiency. The two trends are simular and can ‘be attributed to the same physical reasons. ‘Moreover, it can be observed that for the test cases present 6, the lap welding isa less efficient configuration than that of but: welding. This is expected, considering that in onder fora lap weld to start being fozmed, the entire upper sheet should have been penetrated, while in the case of butt welding, it starts being instantly formed. It is not simple to directly estimate the errs induced by the simplifying assumptions of the welding model in the caleula- tion of energy efficiency. The most reliable method for the estimation of the crors is the comparison with experiments. In (281, comparison of the model with experiments shows er rors in penetration depth p inthe otder of 20%. The erzors in the top surface weld width w arc expected to be mainly affected by errors in spot size diameter and focusing and be smaller, of order 5%, It is more difficult to estimate the error interface width » in the case of lap welding. Approximating the shape of tre weld pool with a conical shape, the interface width can be approximated by s = wd,/p. Assuming canonical error V2 ee ew Fig. 16 Bus welding exergy’ efficiency o¢ a fanetion of laser power inesngating diferent penetration des DspringeInt J Adv Manuf Technol (2017) 9212431253 rn Fig. 17 Lap wolding exergy efficiney as a fonction of laser power inwestguting effort wowing incrace wide distributions inv and p, it tums out tha the errors ins are inthe order of 20%. I nas to be noted that this error may’ be consid- crably larger if the penctation depth is just larger than the top plate widta d, since such penetration depths correspond to the sleepest paris of the curves, shown in Figs. 7 and 8, The errors in the calculated energy efficiency can be direct ly estimated from the formulas (4.7) and (4.8). The errors from the energy E and the weld length d aze negligible, since these quantities are well controlled by modem laser mechine tools, Therefore, in both lap and butt welding geomettes, the error in energy efficiency is expected to be in the order of 20% 5 Conclusions The study of the connection beswveen the process variables and the weld pool geometry KPIs bas resulted in the following conchisions; 1. Penetration begins above a critical laser power which is an increasing function ofthe scanning speed. Indicatively for Imm depth, the critical laser power reaches 4-10 KW, depending ox the scanning speed. Similarly, penetration occurs below a critical scanning speed, whieh is an increasing function of the laser power. For example, for 1 mm depth, ths ertical laser power can rnvimin, for laser powers around 5 kW. bbe as low as The study of the connection between the laser welding process variables and the energy elliciency results in the fol- lowing conclusions: 1. ‘The “result” in the energy efficiency definition should be considered proportional to the achieved strength: thus, the ‘most reasonable choice for @ result being proportional to the joint strength is the area of the interface formed be= tween the two welded pieces 2. The two major factors that affect the strength of a butt ‘eld are the penctration depth and the weld length; then- fore, the result isthe uree formed by these two factors, D springer 3. The three factors that play an important role in the lap joint strongth are cach material's thiesnoss, the weld length, and the width of the imerseetion. In the ease of LW application, the thickness may be omitted; thus, the result of lap LW can be considered equal to the intersec- son area 4, For both butt and lap LW, the energy absorbed for heating ‘up (0 the melting temperature and for the latent heat of | fusion of the material thar has been finally molten is acte- ally the only one that contributes to the result, since itis ‘proportional so the weld pool volume azid, consequently, it is indizectly connected to the interface area 5. The rest are heat energy losses, except for the energy absorbed for the heating and the latent heats of fusion and evaporation of the material that has been finally evap- crated, This may appear to be energy loss, since it is responsible for a reduction in the weld pool volume, On the other hand, evaporation may require the absorption of a large amount of energy, but simultancously, the laser beam is given access to deeper regions of the workpiece. 6, The use of higher lasee power inereases the encigy elfi- ciency. Thus, the end “ihe faster the better” in terms of energy elliciency, being observed in leer dnilling [20], is also followed for the LW process. 7. Ibis observed that as the desired penetration depth ine creases in butt welding and the interface width gets higher, there is a rapid drop in the energy efficiency, 8. In general, lap welding is a less efficient configuration than that of butt welding, since more material has to be ‘molten in onder for the desired strength to be achieved, 9. For high enough scanning speeds or low enough laser ‘powers, there is no keyhole formation; therefore, the pro= cess is actually conduction welding. In this case, energy efficiency appears to de higher than that of keyhole welding; however, it has to be noticed that the depth of ‘the molten pool cannot excced 2 certain value, making this option inapplicable when deeper penetration is required, Aclanowledgements ‘The wove reported in tis paper was suppomd by se collaborative program entitled “Remote Laser Welding System Navigator for Eoo & Resiliea! Automotive Factories (RLW avigetor) "which i unr the Seventh Framework Programme —FoF- ICE2011.74: Digital factories: manufacturing design ard product Iifcycle manayement and the collaborative program emsilee "Enctgy [ivient Process planning System ENEPLAN,” which is under the Sevan Framework Program—Fo# NMP2G1)-): The Beo-Faecory cleaner and mote reroarce-sfficient production in mansfacturing progr: ‘Open Access his ato is distributed under th teas of the Crstive Commons Attcibution 4.0 Tnternational License. (http!// ceativesoamonsomplicensesby/.0), which peri unresticted uss ‘sutton, end reproduction in any medium, provided you give appro- ‘rile crit the om gna auhor®) andthe sours, provide i Hk to he CGrcaive Commons lice, and fica if changes were made,Ins} Ady Mau Teenol (2017) 9212431283 1253 References 16. 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