friction welding

4 Articles

Friction Welding… Wood?

November 8, 2015 by 62 Comments

You’d think writing for Hackaday means we probably don’t get surprised very often by projects… but then we see something we never thought was possible — in this case, the linear friction welding of wood to join it.

Friction welding (also known as stir welding), is the process of taking two pieces of material (typically metal, or plastic), and vibrating one of them super fast while pushing against a stationary piece of the same material — the resulting friction causes a massive heat buildup that can then literally weld the two pieces of material together.

It’s an easy way to bond plastic parts together using a dremel and some 3D printing filament, and while doing it with metal is significantly harder, it is possible to do at home as well.

But according to the video after the break — it’s actually possible to do this with wood.

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Getting Mixed Up With Home Stir Welding

July 3, 2015 by 16 Comments

Most processes designed to join two pieces of what-have-you together are consumptive of something, whether it’s some material acting as a third party to work piece and the tool, or the tool itself. In the wonderful world of friction stir welding, the material of the two pieces under union gets swirled together through friction as the tool traverses the join path. There are, of course, professional machines that perform this with relative ease, but with a large amount of beer on the line, [skookum_choocher] was determined to make his own.

In the first video, he machines a friction welding tool by shaping a tungsten carbide button from a drill bit using a diamond grinder. Once he has a rough shoulder and protuberance going, it’s time to let her rip.  Despite issues with clamping and the geometry of his tool, the weld is ultimately successful at the tail end.

Undeterred, he has another go at it after making some adjustments to the tool shoulder, changing the belt on his poor old Bridgeport, and increasing the clamping strength by a factor of four. You clamp sixteen tons, and whaddya get? A slightly better butt weld than the first time, it turns out. Fearing this weld is insufficient to win the bet, he goes for the lap weld with the work pieces stacked together in a sandwich. We prefer pizza with beer, but nevertheless congratulate him.

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New 3D Printing Technique – Friction Welding

December 30, 2014 by 34 Comments

Even though 3D printers can fabricate complex shapes that would be nearly impossible to mill, they are not well suited to designs requiring bridging or with large empty spaces. To overcome this, [Scorch] has applied an easy plastic welding technique that works with both ABS and PLA. All you need is a rotary tool.

“Friction welding” is the process of rubbing two surfaces together until the friction alone has created enough heat to join them. Industrially, the method is applied to joining large, metal workpieces that would otherwise require a time-consuming weld. In 2012, [Fran] reminded us of a toy from decades ago that allowed children to plastic weld styrene using friction. This modified method is similar to stick welding in that a consumable filler rod is added to the molten joint. Inspired by our coverage of [Fran], [Scorch] experimented and discovered that a stick of filament mounted into a Dremel works just as well for joining 3d prints.

That is all there is to it. Snip off a bit of filament, feed it into your rotary tool, and run a bead to join parts and shapes or do repairs. Friction welded plastic is shockingly strong, vastly superior to glued plastic for some joints. Another tool for the toolbox. See the videos below for [Scorch]’s demo.

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Make Your Own Plastic Friction Welder

December 31, 2012 by 63 Comments

[Fran] shows us how to build a plastic friction welder. It’s a method of connecting plastic pieces. While it’s new to us, apparently this type of tool was given to kids about forty years ago to use with craft project (when plastic was all the craze).

The tip of the friction welder is a styrene rod. If it’s spun fast enough the friction will cause the material to heat to the melting point, depositing a bead of styrene into the joint. The tool seen here is a cheap DC rotary tool acquired from Harbor Freight. It really did a horrible job, but [Fran] discovered that it was the power supply that was under-rated. When she replace the wire that feeds it and used her bench supply it spit out 16,000 rpm without any trouble. The welding rods can be found at the craft store and fit the chuck of the tool quite nicely. You can see her demo in the video after the break. The seam she’s working on comes out very strong, surviving a slew of violent whacks on the workbench.

We’ve seen a few other methods of welding plastic. One used a tool much like a soldering iron, the other depends on ultrasonic waves and clamping pressure.

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