Experimental and Finite Element Analysis of Butt Weld of Double-layer Steel Plates

This paper aims to study the weldability of butt weld of double-layer steel plates. Experiments for three groups of specimens subjected to various parameters are first conducted to obtain angular deformation, residual stress and temperature data. Then, 3-D finite element (FE) thermal simulation of butt welding is carried out to obtain the load-displacement curves under different included angles and weld length. Moreover, the butt welded steel plate welds were parametric analyzed for the stress concentration factor and the formula for the stress concentration factor was fitted according to the data. The analytical results have shown that double-layer butt welded steel plates with better performance compared to single-layer butt welded steel plates, and the proposed stress concentration factor formula predicts well and thus has certain reference value.