Effect of structural restraint caused by the stiffener on welding residual stress and deformation in thick-plate T-joints

Abstract

Two T-joints with and without a stiffener were manufactured using 30 mm thick Q390 steel, and their welding residual stress (WRS) distribution and deformation were measured. Based on ABAQUS software, a thermo-elastic-plastic finite element method was developed to model the stress-strain field of multi-pass welding joints. The WRS distribution and deformation of two T-joints were carefully assessed according to the simulation and experimental results. Further, the effect of the location and dimensions of the stiffener on the WRS and angular distortion of the web for T-joints before and after the removal of the stiffener was numerically analyzed. The findings reveal that the structural restraint has a remarkable effect on the distribution and magnitude of the WRS for T-joints, and after removing the stiffener, the WRS of the T-joint is slightly lower than that of the T-joint under free condition. The structural restraint has a little effect on the angular distortion of the flange, but can effectively alleviate the angular distortion of the web. Before and after the removal of the stiffener, the WRS and angular distortion of the web lessen with the growth of the distance between the stiffener and backing plate or the stiffener width.

Keywords

• Thick-plate welded-joint
• Welding residual stress
• Welding deformation
• Stiffener location
• Stiffener dimensions
• Numerical simulation