The use of aluminum alloys, nowadays, is swiftly growing from the prerequisite of producing higher strength to weight ratio. Lightweight components are crucial interest in most manufacturing sectors, especially in transportation, aviation, maritime, automotive, and others. Traditional available joining methods have an adverse effect on joining these lightweight engineering materials, increasing needs for new environmentally friendly joining methods. Hence, friction stir welding (FSW) is introduced. Friction stir welding is a relatively new welding process that can produce high-quality weld joints with a lightweight and low joining cost with no waste. This paper endeavors to deals with optimizing process parameters for quality criteria on tensile and hardness strengths. Samples were taken from a 5 mm 6061-T6 aluminum alloy sheet with butt joint configuration. Controlled process parameters tool profile, rotational speed and transverse speed were utilized. The process parameters are optimized making use of the combination of Grey relation analysis method and L9 orthogonal array. Mechanical properties of the weld joints are examined through tensile, hardness, and liquid penetrant tests at room temperature. From this research, rotational speed and traverse speed become significant parameters at a 99% confidence interval, and the joint efficiency reached 91.3%.
Experimental Investigation of Friction Stir Welding on 6061-T6 Aluminum Alloy using Taguchi-Based GRA
