Effect of input parameters on friction stir processing of AA2014-T6 using response surface methodology

The friction stir processing is governed by input process attribute like spindle speed, traverse feed, tilt angle and geometry of the tool. In this study, five different shapes of the tool are selected to carry out the process. Response surface methodology (RSM) adopting central composite design has been used as a statistical approach to generate the regression models in order to envisage and estimate ultimate and yield tensile strength of the processed sample. The results indicated that the values predicted by experimentation are in good accordance with the estimated outcome. The objective of this paper is to study the influence of input parameters and geometry of the tool on the tensile strength of the friction stir process. It has been noticed that the input parameters exhibit significance effect on tensile strength and the tool having hexagonal profile yields better strength than the other selected geometries.