Friction stir welding (FSW) is an innovative solid-state welding technology that produces high quality joints and is widely used in the aerospace industry. Previous studies have revealed welding temperature to be a decisive factor for joint quality. Consequently, several temperature control systems for FSW have been developed. These output feedback control systems usually require delicate and expensive temperature measuring equipment, which reduces their suitability for industrial practice. This paper presents a novel state feedback system of the welding temperature to remedy this shortcoming. The system uses a physical model of the FSW process (digital twin) for the determination of the welding temperature signal from the process torque signal. The digital twin is based on a multi-input nonlinear time invariant model, which is fed with the torque signal from the spindle motor. A model-based L1 adaptive controller was employed for its robustness with respect to model inaccuracies and fast adaption to fluctuations in the controlled system. The experimental validation of the feedback control system showed improved weld quality compared to welded joints produced without temperature control. The achieved control accuracies depended on the results of the temperature calculation. Control deviations of less than 10 K could be achieved for certain welding parameters, and even for a work piece geometry, which deliberately caused heat accumulation.

Friction Stir Additive Manufacturing (FSAM) is a novel process with which large-scale aluminum structures can be produced from high-strength alloys such as the 7xxx series. Due to the prevalence of these alloys in airplanes and rockets, the process offers high application potential, for example in fabricating stringers and stiffeners. The building process in FSAM is characterized by sequentially stacking and friction stir lap welding (FSLW) metal sheets. Before adding the next layer, the surface is machined (i.e., by milling). So far, this is a necessary step to enable gap-free welding of the layers, which results in increased costs and reduced layer heights. The investigations described in this paper were aimed at improving the weld surface quality to enable defect-free FSAM without the additional machining step. For this, FSLW was conducted using different welding tools. The resulting welds were evaluated based on superficial and internal characteristics as well as the mechanical properties (shear strength). With a welding tool in which both a rotating and a stationary shoulder were combined, defect-free weld seams with a mean underfill and a mean flash height of 0.07 mm were produced. In a subsequent study, it was proven that defect-free FSAM without surface machining is possible up to the fifth layer using the combined welding tool.

The reliable production of high-quality lithium-ion battery components still poses a challenge, which must be met to cope with their rising demand. One key step in the production sequence is the process of cell-internal contacting, during which the electrode carrier foils of the anode and the cathode are joined with the arrester. This is usually done with ultrasonic or laser beam welding. Both joining processes, however, show limitations concerning the quality of the weld. This paper presents a new approach for cell-internal contacting by using micro-friction stir spot welding. Welding experiments were conducted in which joints with high mechanical strengths were produced. It was also shown that large stacks with foil numbers of 100 can be joined in only a few tenths of a second. The process is therefore especially of interest for the fast production of large-scale battery cells or other new types of high-energy-dense battery cells.

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