Mechanical and wear properties of friction stir welded dissimilar AA6101-T6 and AA1350 alloys: Effect of offset distance and number of passes

AA6101-T6 and AA1350 aluminum alloys have wide-spread applications in electrical industries, especially in bus bar conductors. Hence, joining of these two alloys is inevitable. Main invention of friction stir welding is joining lightweight structures. We investigated the impact of number of passes and changes in location of tool from retreating side to advancing side on the welding properties of AA6101-T6 and AA1350 alloys. For analyzing the welding properties, tensile, bending, wear, micro hardness and microstructural tests were carried out. We found that double pass and offset distance in advancing side exhibits better welding properties, whereas single pass and offset distance in retreating side exhibit poor welding properties. From the analysis of variance (ANOVA), we also determined that offset distance is the most influencing welding parameter than the number of passes.