Integrity and quality assessment applied on laser welded titanium components

Laser welding of thin titanium components, a critical component of many gas turbine engines, has demonstrated a tendency of generating pores in clusters with a prescribed orientation. These pores, also known as chain porosities, are often of harmless sizes (of 50–100 micrometer) as individuals. Though the cluster as such, depending on the distances and orientations in between the pores, may have an impact on the structural integrity. A recently developed algorithm for 3-D positioning of small pore defects in planar geometries using digital X-ray inspection aims at providing 3-D positions of the defects. This could then be used in-line to assess the welding quality in the manufacturing process. This presentation describes the development of a methodology that aims to incorporate non-destructive evaluation with, in this case, structural integrity