Title: Numerical modelling of heat transfer and fluid flow in laser microwelding

Authors: Mayuri Baruah; Swarup Bag

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, Guwahati 781039, Assam, India ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, Guwahati 781039, Assam, India

Abstract: As an intense heat source laser has been successfully employed in microwelding of materials for manufacturing various miniature components. A sophisticated mathematical model of laser microwelding is ever demanding since experimental investigation of the same is costly, expensive, and time consuming. Very little work has been reported in literature on material flow behaviour in microwelding process. Hence, present work is focused on three-dimensional finite element modelling of heat transfer and fluid flow in laser microwelding process. The fluid flow behaviour is validated using order-of-magnitude analysis of liquid velocity under various driving forces. Estimation of several dimensionless numbers describes the nature of material flow within small weld pool. Temperature dependent material properties, latent heat of melting and solidification are incorporated in the model. A harmony search-based meta-heuristic algorithm is incorporated to identify most suitable unknown model input parameters. Simulated results have been validated against experimental data adapted from independent literature.

Keywords: transport phenomena; optimisation; harmony search; finite element method; FEM; miniature components; component manufacturing; heat transfer; fluid flow; numerical modelling; laser microwelding; laser processing; laser welding; mathematical modelling; metaheuristics; simulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMMS.2013.057126

International Journal of Mechatronics and Manufacturing Systems, 2013 Vol.6 No.4, pp.310 - 334

Received: 21 Dec 2012
Accepted: 13 Mar 2013
Published online: 12 Jul 2014 *

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