Resistance Spot Welding with Advanced High-Strength Steels: Cold Stamped and Hot Formed

The discussions relative to cold stamping are applicable to any forming operation occurring at room temperature such as roll forming, hydroforming, or conventional stamping. Similarly, hot stamping refers to any set of operations using Press Hardening Steels (or Press Quenched Steels), including those that are roll formed or fluid formed.

Automakers contemplating whether a part is cold stamped or hot formed must consider numerous factors. This blog covers some important considerations related to welding these materials for automotive applications. Most important is the discussion on Resistance Spot Welding (RSW) as it is the dominating process in automotive manufacturing.  

Setting Correct Welding Parameters for Resistance Spot Welding   

Specific welding parameters need to be developed for each combination of material type and thickness. In general, the Hot Press (HP) steels require more demanding process conditions. One important factor is electrode force which should be higher for the HP steel than for cold press type steel of the same thickness. The actual recommended force will depend on the strength level, and the thickness of the steel. Of course, this will affect the welding machine/welding gun force capability requirement. 

Another important variable is the welding current level and even more important is the current range at which acceptable welds can be made. The current range is weldability measurement, and the best indicator of the welding process robustness in the manufacturing environment and sometime called proceed window. Note the relative range of current for different steel types. A smaller process window may require more frequent weld quality evaluation such as for weld size.  

The Effect of Coating Type on Weldability  

In all cases of resistance spot welding coated steels, it is imperative to move the coating away from the weld area during and in the beginning of the weld cycle to allow a steel-to-steel weld to occur.  The combination of welding current, weld time and electrode force are responsible for this coating displacement.  

For all the coated steels, the ability of the coating to flow is a function of the coating type and properties, such as electrical resistivity and melting point, as well as the coating thickness.  

An example of cross sectioned spot welds made on Hot Press Steel with Aluminum -Silicon coating is shown below. It shows two coating thicknesses and the displaced coating at the periphery of weld. This figure also shows the difference in current range for the different coating thickness. The thicker coating shows a smaller current range. In addition, the Al-Si coating has a much higher melting point than the zinc coatings on the cold stamped steels, making it more difficult to displace from the weld area. 

Liquid Metal Embrittlement and Resistance Spot Welding

Cold-formable, coated, Advance High Strength Steels such as the 3rd Generation Advanced High Strength Steels are being widely used in automotive applications. One welding issue these materials encounter is the increased hardness in the weld area, that sometime results in brittle fracture of the weld.  

Another issue is their sensitivity to Liquid Metal Embrittlement (LME) cracking. These two issues are discussed in detail on the WorldAutoSteel AHSS Guidelines website and our recently released Phase 2 Report on LME. 

Resistance Spot Welding Using Current Pulsation 

The most effective solution for the issues described above is using current pulsation during the welding cycle. A schematic description is shown below.   

The pulsation allows much better control of the heat generation and the weld nugget development. The pulsation variables include the number of pulses (typically 2-4), the current level and time for each pulse, and the cool time between the pulses. 

In summery, pulsation (and sometime current upslope) in Resistance Spot Welding proved to be beneficial for the following applications: 

• PHS steels  

• Coated Cold Stamped steels 

• Cold stamped Advance High Strength Steels 

• Multi materials stack-ups – As described in our articles here on 3T/4T and 5T Stack-Ups

Thanks is given to Menachem Kimchi, Associate Professor-Practice, Dept of Materials Science, Ohio State University and Technical Editor – Joining, AHSS Application Guidelines, for this article.