from the conferences organized by TANGER Ltd.
Ensuring high strength at low weight in aircraft joints presents a constant challenge for designers and researchers. One widely used material in this industry is 2xxx series aluminum alloys. This study investigates the effects of shot peening on the surface layer properties of FSW-welded butt joints made from EN AW-2024 aluminum alloy in the T3 temper, both with and without Alclad coating. The methodology involved shot peening the welded joint for 3 minutes at a pressure of 0.6 MPa using 1.5 mm diameter bearing balls. The treatment generated compressive residual stresses in both material variants. Analysis of stress magnitude and FWHM values revealed greater strain hardening in the unclad alloy. This trend was also evident in surface layer microhardness measurements. Surface roughness parameters improved significantly after shot peening in both cases, with particularly pronounced effects observed for the Alclad variant. The Ra value for the aluminum with Alclad was 0.811 μm at the weld, which is more than twice as low as the untreated weld (Ra = 1.9 μm).
Keywords: Friction Stir Welding, shot peening, aluminium EN AW-2024 T3, alclad, residual stress, microhardness, roughness.© This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.