hello, welding engineering intern Metarinka here again.
We have a common problem in our shop, mounting plates for motors ( T made of 2 pieces of plate generally from .125-.5" Low carbon steel) that have gussets on them. As of right now the gussets are fully weld as well as the fillet joint on both sides of the plate.
There have been issues with distortion.
now I know from shop knowledge and my rudementary understanding of joint design that such a part is being overwelded however I don't have any information or numbers to back that up. I've already argued and convinced engineers to put a staggered stitch fillet instead of a full seam, and I'm hoping I can convince them that welding the full seam length of a gusset adds little to strength and just increases distortion. As my understanding goes gussets transmit forces in compression and as such the part would be prone to buckling or collapse of it's members before the welds at it's base would fail. I'm comfortable that 1-2" of fillet per leg would more than satisfy strength req's
Does anyone know where I could find some technical knowledge on weld design that would cover this? Would structural code contain this information. something akin to telling me how much strength I'm getting per length of fillet weld or specifically for gussets. Are there any general welding design theory books like that? if I remember correctly after a point in welding a fillet weld (both sides) the welded joint is stronger than the base metal and the weld should always fail at the toes of the weld. it would be nice to have a book that put numbers to these sort of things
I'll add a drawing if needed, the weldment is a T made out of 2 pieces of plate with a triangle shaped gusset flush with the outside edge. The gussets generally get a full fillet along their "inside" and a full sq groove (no bevel) along the outside.