In-situ monitoring of hybrid friction diffusion bonded EN AW 1050/EN CW 004A lap joints using artificial neural nets

Abstract

In this work, a dissimilar copper/aluminum lap joint was generated by force-controlled hybrid friction diffusion bonding setup (HFDB). During the welding process, the appearing torque, the welding force as well as the plunge depth are recorded over time. Due to the force-controlled process, tool wear and the use of different materials, the resulting data series varies significantly, which makes quality assurance according to classical methods very difficult. Therefore, a Convolutional Neural Network was developed which allows the evaluation of the recorded process data. In this study, data from sound welds as well as data from samples with weld defects were considered. In addition to the different welding qualities, deviations from the ideal conditions due to tool wear and the use of different alloys were also considered. The validity of the developed approach is determined by cross validation during the training process and different amounts of training data. With an accuracy of 88.5%, the approach of using Convolutional Neural Network has proven to be a suitable tool for monitoring the processes.