The Effects of Different Fillers on the Mechanical Properties and Microstructure of butt Welded Alumunium Alloy 6061

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation is to study the effects of using different filler alloys to the mechanical properties and microstructure of welded AA6061. Single V butt joint configuration has been used in the welded joint and use GTAW process to weld the AA6061 plate bar. Tensile test, micro hardness test and microstructure examination were conducted on this butt joint. The tensions of the base metal obtains around 307 MPa UTS an average while the weld metal of AA6061 that welded with filler ER5356 and ER4043 were each obtained around 174 MPa and 169 MPa. The welded joint that used ER5356 filler shows more ductile and harder compared with the weld metal that used filler ER4043. The different properties of tensile strength, ductility and hardness in both weld metal was due to the difference of a major element in the both filler compositions. The amount of magnesium content in ER5356 filler has played a role in enhancing the mechanical properties such as strength, hardness and ductility of weld metal. The different filler alloy also gives different microstructure texture in weld metal.