A new welding distortion analysis method considering inherent deformation-based tendon force estimation

This paper presents a new analysis method for predicting welding distortions induced by welding heat during the assembly process in various engineering fields. In the proposed method, the tendon force contributing to longitudinal bending deformation is calculated based on the measured inherent deformations in the welding specimen. Additionally, welding distortions along the transverse and longitudinal directions are simultaneously estimated without undesired numerical errors by adopting orthotropic thermal coefficients. Through the proposed method, reliable numerical solutions can be obtained using only linear elastic analysis with the finite element procedure. Consequently, the proposed method can be easily applied to multi-pass welding problems without requiring additional treatments, as it relies on the inherent deformations for the analysis. The performance of the proposed method is verified through numerical and experimental investigations for fillet-welded structures.