Friction Stir Welding of Rectangular Flat Plates by using Hand Drilling Machine

In the present work, friction stir welding is performed by using experimental setup installed with hand drilling machine. The tool and workpiece materials are selected according to the capacity of hand drilling machine. The mild steel tool and rectangular lead alloy workpiece plates were manufactured in the workshop. The experiments were performed at three weld speeds and butt joint was prepared. The welded butt joint undergone visual inspection and tensile test. Tensile strength, deflection, stiffness and resilience were obtained and graphical analysis was done to study the effect of weld speed on mechanical behaviour. Static structural analysis was also performed in order to investigate maximum stress distribution in the plates during friction stir welding process. The main purpose of this work is to introduce friction stir welding in workshop level for joining of low melting point materials through low cost setup based on hand drilling machine.