Titanium Welding Code Creeps Ahead at AWS

From Design News comes this on Titanium welding...

A much-anticipated welding code expected to aid designers and spur the use of titanium in industrial and military applications outside of the aerospace sector continues to make steady progress towards final approval.

Now in its eighth draft, the D1.9 Structural Welding Code--Titanium was submitted in late May to the American Welding Society’s (AWS), Structural Welding Committee. From there it will go to the Miami-based AWS’s Technical Activities Committee (TAC), composed of 40 members representing a broad cross section of the U.S. welding industry.

John Gayler, AWS senior staff engineer, described the code as a document whose publication will follow the rigorous approval guidelines of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), Washington. It’s expected that AWS approval of the code will come in late 2006 or early 2007--possibly sooner.

Once finalized by AWS, the code will be submitted to ANSI for publication. The code will define minimum requirements for welding titanium in structural applications. It is a methodology that includes an introduction, a design section covering static and cyclic loading, details on fabrication, assembly, inspection and welding procedures, and a series of final commentaries.

It also will include a mandatory ballistic annex, providing specific data offering weld specifications for titanium vehicle structures subject to potential ballistic threats during combat operations.

John Lawmon, principal engineer at Edison Welding Institute (EWI), Columbus, OH, said new business opportunities to design and develop titanium parts for structural/architectural and military vehicular applications are spurring the effort to draft the code.

The Army's requirements to produce lighter, more deployable systems is a key factor in its use of titanium and the development of a structural welding code, explained Stephen Luckowski, chief, prototype manufacturing team for the Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center (ARDEC), Picatinny Arsenal, NJ.

Luckowski serves as the chairman of the AWS’s D1N subcommittee on titanium structures. Lawmon, the vice chairman of the D1N subcommittee, said that, once finalized, the code will define critical areas of concern to design engineers, like weld fatigue. Lawmon said that while fatigue is well documented for welded titanium components used in the aerospace industry, there is very little information available in the public domain for construction applications like roofs and facades or structural parts for military ground vehicles.