Combined effects of local residual stresses, internal pores, and microstructures on the mechanical properties of laser-welded Ti-6Al-4V sheets

Laser-welded Ti-6Al-4V is prone to severe residual stresses, microstructural variation, and structural defects which are known detrimental to the mechanical properties of weld joints. Residual stress removal is typically applied to weld joints for engineering purposes via heat treatment, in order to avoid premature failure and performance degradation. In the present work, we found that proper welding residual stresses in laser-welded Ti-6Al-4V sheets can maintain better ductility during uniaxial tension, as opposed to the stress-relieved counterparts. A detailed experimental investigation has been performed on the deformation behaviours of Ti-6Al-4V butt welds, including residual stress distribution characterizations by focused ion beam ring-coring coupled with digital image correlation (FIB-DIC), X-ray computerized tomography (CT) for internal voids, and in-situ DIC analysis of the subregional strain evolutions. It was found that the pores preferentially distributed near the fusion zone (FZ) boundary, where the compressive residual stress was up to -330 MPa. The removal of residual stress resulted in a changed failure initiation site from the base material to the FZ boundary, the former with ductile and the latter with brittle fracture characteristics under tensile deformation. The combined effects of residual stresses, microstructures, and internal pores on the mechanical responses are discussed in detail. This work highlights the importance of inevitable residual stress and pores in laser weld pieces, leading to key insights for post-welding treatment and service performance evaluations.