Modelling of thermal phenomena in electric arc during surfacing

Despite very rapid development of science in the recent years, the issues occurring in the electric arc have not been fully recognized. The main reason for this situation is the complexity of phenomena which occur in the arc as well as very high temperatures. The paper presents results of numerical calculations of phenomena which occur in the welding arc. The CFD Fluent package was used for modelling the following phenomena in the electric arc: melting, solidifying, generation of heat and multiphase flows. The 3D Model of a 50×30×6 metal plate cutaway padded with the use of the GMA method with a wire of 1.2 mm diameter was developed. The paper focuses on presenting the distribution of temperatures in time, the process of melting and later solidifying of the material, as well as the transport of the material from the arc to the padding weld. It also shows the initial verification of the model by comparing the results with a picture recorded by 1000 frames/second fast camera.