한국해양공학회지 제28권 제6호, pp 540-545, 2014년 12월 / ISSN(print) 1225-0767 / ISSN(online) 2287-6715

Original Research Article Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology 28(6), 540-545 December, 2014
http://dx.doi.org/10.5574/KSOE.2014.28.6.540

Low Heat Input Welding to Improve Impact Toughness

of Multipass FCAW-S Weld Metal
* ** **
Kook-soo Bang , Chan Park and Ho-shin Jeong
*
Department of Materials System Engineering, Pukyong National University, Busan, Korea
**
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Pukyong National University, Busan, Korea

KEY WORDS: FCAW-S, Reheating, Heat input, Impact toughness, Hydrogen content

ABSTRACT: Multipass self-shielded flux cored arc welding with different heat inputs (1.3–2.0 kJ/mm) was conducted to determine the effects of
the heat input on the proportion of the reheated region, impact toughness, and diffusible hydrogen content in the weld metal. The reheated region
showed twice the impact toughness of the as-deposited region because of its fine grained ferritic-pearlitic microstructure. With decreasing heat input,
the proportion of the reheated region in the weld metal became higher, even if the depth of the region became shallower. Accordingly, the greatest
impact toughness, 69 J at -40°C, was obtained for the lowest heat input welding, 1.3 kJ/mm. Irrespective of the heat input, little difference was
observed in the hardness and diffusible hydrogen content in the weld metal. This result implies that low heat input welding with 1.3 kJ/mm can
be performed to obtain a higher proportion of reheated region and thus greater impact toughness for the weld metal without the concern of
hydrogen cracking.

1. Introdcuction Rogerson(Dorling and Rogerson, 1982) reported that, when

welded with a weaving technique, the proportion of reheated
Self-shielded flux cored arc welding (FCAW-S) has advantages region becomes higher in higher heat input welding. This
over semi-automatic welding processes by virtue of its suggests that the effect of welding procedure, especially
self-shielding capability, which makes it especially suitable for welding technique and heat input, on the proportion of the
site erection welding of structural steel, shipbuilding, and in reheated region and thus the impact toughness of multipass
constructing offshore oil production platforms(Keeler, 1981; FCAW-S weld metal is complicated.
Rodgers and Lochhead, 1987; Hesbrrok, 1993). Because no If low heat input welding is performed to get a higher
external shielding gas is used, strong nitride formers such as proportion of reheated region, the possibility of hydrogen
Al must be added in the weld metal(Killing, 1980; Kotecki cracking in the weld metal should be concerned. Hydrogen
and Narayanan, 2005). This induces a bainitic microstructure cracking is one of the most serious welding problems and
in the as-deposited weld metal and results in low impact may result in expensive time consuming repair operations.
toughness. As it is known that the reheating of the Hydrogen cracking basically depends upon the following
as-deposited weld metal by successive passes in multipass three factors: hydrogen content, residual stress, and hardness
welding retransforms the brittle bainitic microstructure to the of the weld metal(Easterling, 1992). Among these three factors,
tough fine polygonal ferrite, research works(Dorling et al., low heat input welding especially influences following two
1978; Pisarski et al., 1987; Boniszewski, 1992) have been factors: hydrogen content and hardness. Low heat input
conducted to find out a suitable welding procedure to get a welding facilitates fast cooling of the weld metal, giving less
higher proportion of reheated region in the weld metal. time for the hydrogen to diffuse away from the weld metal,
Boniszewski(Boniszewski, 1992) reported that, when welded and easily hardening the weld metal. This implies that
with a stringer bead technique, the proportion of reheated attention should be paid when low heat input welding is
region becomes higher as travel speed becomes faster, i.e., utilized to get a higher proportion of reheated region in the
heat input becomes lower. In contrast, Dorling and weld metal. However, studies on the effect of heat input on

Received 12 June 2014, revised 15 November 2014, accepted 15 December 2014

Corresponding author Kook-soo Bang: +82-51-629-6379, ksbang@pknu.ac.kr
ⓒ 2014, The Korean Society of Ocean Engineers

540
 Low Heat Input Welding for Improvement of Impact Toughness of Multipass FCAW-S Weld Metal 541

the hydrogen content are rarely found. In this work, multipass residual hydrogen before welding, the specimens were
FCAW-S weld metals were fabricated with different heat degassed at 400℃ for two hours in air. After degassing, the
inputs. The improvement of impact toughness in the reheated specimens were ground to remove the oxide layer and
region was ascertained first, and then the effects of heat input degreased in acetone. The specimens were assembled in a
on the proportion of the reheated region, impact toughness, copper welding fixture and welded with three different heat
and hydrogen content of weld metal were investigated. inputs. The weld was quenched rapidly after welding and
stored at –70℃ or a lower temperature. The mercury displacement
2. Experimental Procedures procedure using eudiometer tubes was used to measure
diffusible hydrogen contents according to the recommendations
Three FCAW-S multipass welds with different heat inputs, of the AWS specification. After measuring the amount of
1.3, 1.6, and 2.0 kJ/mm, were fabricated in a 29 mm thick weld metal hydrogen, the values were corrected for the
plate using 2.0 mm diameter AWS E81T8-Ni1 wire. The weld standard temperature, atmospheric pressure, and humidity
beads were laid using the stringer bead technique in a Vee conditions. The values were reported in terms of 100 g deposited
butt joint. The welding parameters and joint configuration metal.
used are shown in Table 1.
Constant values of welding current, 200 A, and voltage, 20 3. Results And Discussion
V, were used for all welds, and a range of travel speeds
from 120 to 180 mm/min was used to obtain three different In multipass welding, except for the final layer, all layers
heat inputs. Macrosections of three welds are shown in Fig. are reheated by successive passes and thus the weld metal
1. Standard optical microstructural observations in the weld consists of two regions: as-deposited and reheated regions. As
metals were conducted. Vickers hardness of the weld metals the microstructures differ considerably between the two regions,
was also measured. it is possible to distinguish the two by optical microscopic
The diffusible hydrogen content in weld metals was observations. Figure 2 shows a typical microstructure of a
determined according to AWS A4.3-86. The test specimens, weld metal containing two regions. Region ⓐ is an as-
which were composed of a center test piece and the starting deposited region. Region ⓑ is a reheated region that is affected
and run-off tabs, were made from 600 MPa grade high by the successive pass. Magnified microstructures of each
tensile strength steel(JIS G 3103 SM570). For the removal of region are shown in Fig. 3. The as-deposited region (a)

Table 1 Welding conditions and joint configuration

Current Voltage Speed Heat input
Joint configuration
[A] [V] [mm/min] [kJ/mm]

120 2.0

200 20 150 1.6

180 1.3

Fig. 1 Macrosection of three different welds. (a) 2.0 kJ/mm, (b) 1.6 kJ/mm, (c) 1.3 kJ/mm
542 Kook-soo Bang, Chan Park and Ho-shin Jeong

Fig. 2 Typical microstructure of multipass weld metal Fig. 3 Microstructure of (a) as-deposited and (b) reheated region

reveals a bainitic microstructure with grain boundary ferrite.

In contrast, the reheated region (b) shows a fine grained
ferritic-pearlitic microstructure. Microhardness measurement
(load 500 g) showed that the as-deposited and reheated
region has 224 Hv and 196 Hv, respectively. From the
microstructural observation and microhardness measurement,
it is expected that the reheated region could have higher impact
toughness than the as-deposited region. However, impact
toughness of two regions have not been measured and
compared yet because each region is too small in size to
extract impact toughness specimens. In this study, thermally
simulated specimens that have a duplicated microstructure
for each region by thermal simulation were used to measure
impact toughness of the two regions. Theoretically, a reheated Fig. 4 Variation of impact absorbed energy as a function of
microstructure should be obtained by reheating an as-deposited reheating temperature
microstructure. However, according to Evans(Evans, 1985),
when the weld metal is reheated above A3 temperature by three different peak temperatures, 1300℃, 1100℃, and 950℃
thermal simulation, the microstructure of the simulated weld were selected to simulate the reheating. Specimens were
metal does not depend on whether the simulated specimen is heated to each peak temperature within 10s and maintained
as-deposited or reheated and is only determined by the for 5s. The specimens were then cooled at a cooling rate of
composition of the weld metal and simulating schemes. 20℃/s in the temperature range from 800 to 500℃. After
Therefore, the specimens for the thermal simulation in the thermal simulation, the standard 2mm V-notch Charpy
size of 11×11×55 mm were extracted from the mid-thickness impact test specimens were machined and tested at –20℃.
of the weld metal and then thermally simulated. Based on the The results of the impact tests are compared in Fig. 4. The
A3 temperature of the weld metal which was calculated using impact absorbed energy of the specimen heated to 1300℃
the equation developed by Brandis(Eisenhuttenleute, 1992), was about 50 J. However, this doubled to about 100 J in the
 Low Heat Input Welding for Improvement of Impact Toughness of Multipass FCAW-S Weld Metal 543

increase with increasing the number of the regions. In this

regard, low heat input welding is more desirable because it
gives more successive passes as shown in Fig. 1. However, in
addition to the number of the region, the depth of the region
itself should also be taken into account because the depth
would become shallower in lower heat input welding because
of the smaller heat of the subsequent pass. As the
microstructure of reheated region is quite different from the
as-deposited region, the depth of the reheated region can be
measured easily using optical micrographs. The average
depth of the regions was 1.64, 1.20, and 0.97 mm, respectively,
in 2.0, 1.6, and 1.3 kJ/mm heat input, confirming shallower
depth in lower heat input welding. Therefore, the effect of
heat input on the proportion of the reheated regions reflects
the two contradictory factors: number and depth. Standard
2mm V-notch Charpy impact test specimens were extracted
from the weld metals. Figure 6 shows the location of the
specimens. Reheated regions are indicated as dotted line in
the figure. The notch was positioned 4mm away from the
center of the weld metal. The proportion of the reheated
regions at the notch location was 37, 40, and 48 %,
respectively, in 2.0, 1.6, and 1.3 kJ/mm heat input. This result
Fig. 5 Microstructure of simulated specimens heated to (a) 1300℃
indicates that, when low heat input welding is performed,
and (b) 950℃
even if the depth of the reheated region becomes shallower,
specimens heated to 950℃ and 1100℃. Figure 5 shows the the overall proportion of the region becomes higher because
microstructures of the simulated specimens heated to 1300℃ of the larger number of the regions. The results of impact
and 950℃. It shows that the specimen heated to 1300℃ (a) has tests at –40℃ are shown in Fig. 7. While about 50 J of
a similar microstructure to the as-deposited microstructure impact absorbed energy is obtained in 1.6 and 2.0 kJ/mm
shown in Fig. 3 (a). In contrast, the specimen heated to 950℃ (b) heat input, 69 J is obtained in 1.3 kJ/mm heat input,
has a similar microstructures to the reheated microstructure indicating a beneficial effect of lower heat input welding on
shown in Fig. 3 (b). This indicates that reheating to 1300℃ the impact toughness of multipass FCAW-S weld metal
could duplicate the as-deposited microstructure, while reheating because of higher proportion of the reheated regions. In
to 950℃ could duplicate the reheated microstructure even if addition to the microstructural modification effect discussed
the simulation samples are extracted from the multipass weld above, stress relief effect, if any, is also expected by the
metal. Above results suggest that the higher the proportion of successive pass. However, no attempt was made to
the reheated region in the multipass FCAW-S weld metal, the investigate the stress relief effect in this experiment. The
greater the impact toughness of weld metal. effect of stress relief on the weld metal toughness requires
The proportion of the reheated regions is expected to further investigations.

Fig. 6 Location of Charpy impact test specimen in three different welds

544 Kook-soo Bang, Chan Park and Ho-shin Jeong

Table 2 Diffusible hydrogen content in three different weld metals

Heat input Diffusible hydrogen content

[kJ/mm] [mL/100g]

1.3 11.0 10.8 12.7 11.1 (11.4)

1.6 11.8 11.5 11.4 10.7 (11.4)

2.0 11.0 11.3 10.9 11.4 (11.2)

kJ/mm. Even if faster cooling rate is observed with lowering

heat input, its difference is minimal. Vickers hardness
measurement (load 10 kg) in the weld metal was made at the
root region where hydrogen cracking starts in general.
Irrespective of the heat input, three weld metals showed
Fig. 7 Variation of impact absorbed energy as a function of heat
almost same hardness, 222 Hv – 225 Hv. The results of
input
diffusible hydrogen content measurements are summarized in
Table 2. The contents were 11.4, 11.4, and 11.2 mL/100g,
respectively, when heat input is 1.3, 1.6, and 2.0 kJ/mm.
Above results indicates that the difference of cooling rate or
heat input in this experimental range gives little effect on the
hardness and diffusible hydrogen content in the weld metal.
This shows that low heat input welding with 1.3 kJ/mm can
be performed to get a high proportion of the reheated
regions and thus high impact toughness without the risk of
hydrogen cracking in the weld metal.

4. Conclusions

Multipass self-shielded flux cored arc welding with different

Fig. 8 Weld cooling curve when welded with 1.3 kJ/mm heat inputs, 1.3-2.0 kJ/mm, were conducted to determine the
effects of heat input on the proportion of the reheated region,
If lower heat input welding is conducted to utilize the impact toughness, and diffusible hydrogen content of weld
beneficial effect on the impact toughness, weld metal hydrogen metal. Important findings are as follows.
cracking can be a problem. After welding, weld metal (1) Due to the fine grained ferritic-pearlitic microstructure,
inevitably contains some diffusible hydrogen; in combination the reheated region in the weld metal had much higher
with the hardened microstructure, this can lead to hydrogen impact toughness than the as-deposited region. The thermal
average in parentheses cracking in weld metal. Welding with simulation test showed that the reheated region has two
lower heat input facilitates faster cooling of the weld metal, times greater impact toughness than the as-deposited region.
giving less time for hydrogen to diffuse away from the weld (2) Even if shallower reheated regions are formed, a higher
metal. Moreover, hardened microstructures are easily formed proportion of reheated region was obtained in lower heat
during fast cooling. Cooling rate was determined to estimate input welding because of the larger number of reheated
the effect of heat input on the cooling time in this regions. Accordingly, the largest impact toughness, 69 J at -40℃,
experiment. Cooling curve was obtained by plunging a was obtained in the lowest heat input welding of 1.3 kJ/mm.
W-5%Re/W-26%Re thermocouple of 0.3 mm diameter into a (3) Because of little difference of cooling rate between the
weld pool. Figure 8 shows a typical cooling curve obtained in heat inputs, almost same hardness and diffusible hydrogen
1.3kJ/mm welding for an example. It shows that the time for content are obtained in the weld metals. This suggests that
the weld metal to cool down to 300℃ is about 14s. low heat input welding with 1.3 kJ/mm can be performed to
Meanwhile, the time was 17 s in 1.6 kJ/mm, and 19 s in 2.0 get a high proportion of reheated regions and thus high
 Low Heat Input Welding for Improvement of Impact Toughness of Multipass FCAW-S Weld Metal 545

impact toughness without the risk of hydrogen cracking in Oxford, UK.

the weld metal. Eisenhuttenleute, V.D., 1992. Steel. Handbook for Materials
Research and Engineering. Springer-Verlag, Berlin.
Acknowledgement Evans, G.M., 1985. The Effects of Heat Treatment on the
Microstructure and Properties of C-Mn All Weld Metal
This work was supported by a Research Grant of Pukyong Deposits. Metal Construction, 17(10), 676-682.
National University(2014) Hesbrrok, W.G., 1993. Adopting Self-shielded Wire Welding for
Shipbuilding. Welding & Metal Fabrication, 6, 223-224.
Keeler T., 1981. Innershield Welding. Part 1: Development
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