Study on Self-piercing Rivet and Mechanical Properties of Aluminum Alloy Joint

Abstract

In this work, the self-piercing rivet (SPR) experiments were carried out and the mechanical properties tests under different SPR process were taken. The effects of SPR process on the geometric characteristics and strength of the joint were studied. It was found that the SPR joint under displacement-controlled process had larger interlocking value, higher mechanical properties, more stable geometric characteristics, and better mechanical properties. The failure mode of SPR joints was mainly pull-off failure. And the mechanical properties of SPR joints decreased with the increase of head height of SPR, while the residual thickness has no significant effect on the mechanical properties. The mechanical properties of SPR joints were significantly improved when structural adhesive was added into SPR joints, in which the failure mode was transformed into joint drawing failure. In addition, the fatigue behavior of SPR joint was studied. It was found that there was no significant difference between displacement-control process and energy-control process in fatigue performance of SPR joint. Moreover, cracks were initiated on the surface, which meet the surface initiation mechanism.