Fatigue life estimation of ultrasonic spot welded Mg alloy joints

• Fatigue life test of USWed similar Mg alloy was investigated.
• USW joints exhibited a superior fatigue life compared with other welding processes.
• Life prediction model agreed fairly well with the obtained experimental results.
• The fatigue failure mode changed with decreasing cyclic load level.

Lightweight magnesium alloys are increasingly used in automotive and other transportation industries for weight reduction and fuel efficiency improvement. The structural application of magnesium components requires proper welding and fatigue resistance to guarantee their durability and safety. The objective of this investigation was to identify failure mode and estimate fatigue life of ultrasonic spot welded (USWed) lap joints of an AZ31B-H24 magnesium alloy. It was observed that the solid-state USWed joints exhibited a superior fatigue life compared with other welding processes. Fatigue failure mode changed from interfacial failure to transverse-through-thickness crack growth with decreasing cyclic load level, depending on the welding energy. Fatigue crack initiation and propagation occurred from both the notch tip inside the faying surface and the edge of sonotrode indentation-footprints due to the presence of stress concentration. A life prediction model for the spot welded lap joints developed by Newman and Dowling was adopted to estimate the fatigue lives of the USWed magnesium alloy joints. The fatigue life estimation, based on the fatigue crack growth model with the global and local stress intensity factors as a function of kink length and the experimentally determined kink angle, agreed fairly well with the obtained experimental results.