Influence of weld quality on the fatigue strength in seam welds

In this paper a research study has been carried out on the link between weld quality of production welds and the fatigue strength. It has been carried out as a part of a Swedish Technology Platform for lightweight optimised welded structures (LOST), where some of the work packages within the project intend to connect the design and analysis to production and weld quality. One of the results is a new weld quality system from Volvo Group, which has a scientific background, is open for public use and focus on features important for fatigue in welded joints. In this study the emphasis is on a couple of features within the new weld quality system: weld toe radius and the possible existence of weld defects such as cold laps. Large scatter of the local weld geometry was observed for different welding processes. Also the results show that the weld position has a significant effect on the quality and the fatigue resistance of fillet welds and that it may be the difference between normal quality and high quality welds.