Cold cracking

A welding defect is any flaw that compromises the usefulness of a . There is a great variety of welding defects. Welding imperfections are classified according to ISO 6520 while their acceptable limits are specified in ISO 5817 and ISO 10042.

According the the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), causes of welding defects can be broken down as follows: 45 percent poor process conditions, 32 percent operator error, 12 percent wrong technique, 10 percent incorrect consumables, and 5 percent bad weld grooves.

The magnitude of stress that can be formed from welding can be roughly calculated using:

Where E is Young's modulus, α is the coefficient of thermal expansion, and ΔT is the temperature change. For steel this calculates out to be approximately 3.5 GPa (510,000 psi).

Defects related to fracture.

Arc strike cracking occurs when the arc is struck but the spot is not welded. This occurs because the spot is heated above the material's upper critical temperature and then essentially quenched. This forms martensite, which is brittle and may lead to higher chances of micro-cracks. Usually the arc is struck in the weld groove so this type of crack does not occur, but if the arc is struck outside of the weld groove then it must be welded over to prevent the cracking. If this is not an option then the arc spot can be postheated, that is, the area is heated with an oxy-acetylene torch, and then allowed to cool slowly.

Residual stresses can reduce the strength of the base material, and can lead to catastrophic failure through cold cracking. Cold cracking is limited to steels and is associated with the formation of martensite as the weld cools. The cracking occurs in the heat-affected zone of the base material. To reduce the amount of distortion and residual stresses, the amount of heat input should be limited, and the welding sequence used should not be from one end directly to the other, but rather in segments.

Cold cracking only occurs when all the following preconditions are met:

Eliminating any one of these will eliminate this condition.

Crater cracks occur when a crater is not filled before the arc is broken. This causes the outer edges of the crater to cool more quickly than the crater, which creates sufficient stresses to form a crack. Longitudinal, transverse and/or multiple radial cracks may form.

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