from the conferences organized by TANGER Ltd.
Resistance spot welds (RSW) are one of the main joining technologies of thin plates in automotive industry. Key factors affecting the strength of the RSW joint are the nugget diameter, asymmetry, expulsions, intended surfaces, and presence of cracks. Despite its broad use, the weld quality verification is limited only to destructive testing and small number of NDT methods. Most of the testing is done destructively by sampling, which assesses only systematic defects. Ultrasonic Testing is the most used NDT method to detect nonsystematic defects in the RSW joints however the probability of defect detection (POD) of conventional testing technique is not fully satisfactory. Other approaches were invented to deal with this situation. The article compares the currently most used NDT approach with other options and discusses its usability and mutual interchangeability.
Keywords: automotive, resistance spot welding, thermography, ultrasonic testing, probability of detection© This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.