Laserstrahl- und Laserhybridschweißverbindungen aus ultrahochfesten Feinkornbaustählen. Teil 2: Ermüdungsfestigkeit

Laser beam and laser-GMAW-hybrid welded joints made of high-strength fine-grained structural steels – part 2: fatigue strength. Innovative welding processes, such as laser beam and laser-GMAW-hybrid welding, offer advantages over conventional gas metal arc welding (abbr.: GMAW) processes due to a reduced heat input during the welding of high-strength fine-grained structural steels. The materials, with nominal yield strengths of up to 1300 MPa, are already being used in mobile crane construction and related industries, particularly in telescopic booms. So far, both conventionally welded and laser beam welded joints have been avoided in highly-stressed areas of load-bearing structures. For the latter, in particular, this is due to a lack of experience and design rules. To counter this, part 1 presented the basics of laser beam and laser hybrid welding processes, welding tests and a characterisation of butt welds (visual, dye penetration and X-ray tests as well as transverse tensile tests and hardness field measurements). This article (part 2) focuses the fatigue strength of these welded joints made of the high-strength fine-grained structural steels S960MC, S1100M, S1100QL and S1300QL. The properties under cyclic loading are quantified for the details butt joint with and without different sheet thicknesses as well as for longitudinal stiffeners. In particular, the laser beam welded joints show a high fatigue strength with a remarkably low scatter of the individual test results. Based on the fatigue test results, fatigue classifications for the nominal stress concept are derived and design recommendations are presented.