Effects of spot welding on the functionality of thin-wall elements of car‘s deformation zone

Abstract

The effect of changed characteristics of the spotweldedconnections on the absorbed energy, deformationform and axial shortening of typical thin-walled elementsof car’s deformation zones was estimated. The experimentalquasi-static and impact tests of the axial crushing ofcolumns were performed to validate FE models whichwere used for the simulations to evaluate the influence ofspot-welding on the mechanical behavior. The experimentalresults of statically and dynamically axial crushed thinwalledcolumns showed that the dynamically deformedthin-walled columns absorb from 10 to 50% more energythan those statically deformed. The good correlation betweenthe results of dynamical experiments and FE simulationswas obtained. The FE simulations show that reducingstrength of spot-welded connections changes the behaviorand decreases the amount of absorbed energy.