Mohsen Eshraghi - Department of Mechanical Engineering, California State University, Los Angeles

Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was employed to study the effect of process parameters on weld pool properties during Resistance Spot Welding process. The material under study was DP600 dual phase steel. The modelaccounted for interactions between: the electro-kinetics and heat transfer via the Joule effect, the heat transfer and phasetransformations through latent heat, and the heat transfer, electro-kinetics, and mechanicalbehavior via the contact conditions. A design of experiments (DOE) method was used to analyze the main effects and interactions of the various processing parameters over a practical range of values.The influence of electrical current intensity, welding time, sheet thickness, electrode face radius, and squeeze force was investigated. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to quantify the significance of changingeach process parameter and its interactions with other parameters. The simulation model used in this study can be considered as a very useful tool for engineers to develop optimal welding parameters in order to achieve desire weld properties.