oversized fillet welds

Date 07-09-2008 15:52

There are no restrictions or limitations on welds that are larger than that specified by the welding symbol in D1.1. That being said, welds that are larger than required are expensive in the terms of time, material, and cost. They can also result in unacceptable distortion or them may interfere with proper assembly with mating components.

Best regards - Al

By Metarinka (****)

Date 07-09-2008 16:25

It also should be mentioned that an oversized weld will introduce an unexpected amount of heat input that could have a wide variety of effects on the base material. I believe it is more of an engineering question as to whether there will be unintended consequences with the inclusion of a oversized weld.

By jwright650 (*****)

Date 07-09-2008 16:38

All good answers above....as usual, I have nothing really to add to those comments.

Was the oversized welds due to chasing undercut?

I have seen welders forget to turn the machine down and weld something much thinner and undercut at the toes so they add additional passes to fill in and end up with larger multi-pass welds where a single 1/4" fillet was required.

And then I have also inspected welds where the drawing called for 1/2" fillets at some joints and 1/4" fillets at others but the welder didn't pay attention and welded 1/2" fillets where the 1/4" fillets were called out.

I suppose there could be all sorts of reasons as to why the welds were larger than called for.....

By Travis Collins (**)

Date 07-09-2008 17:45

yes the oversized weld was laid to cover undercut. I believe that this bolt connection will have plenty of clearance but just didnt know if there was a limitation in D1.1 on oversize fillet weld. Thank you all for your help