Fabrication and Fatigue

Failure in Aluminum
Close attention to design and best practices
can simplify construction and extend
the working life of a high-speed aluminum boat.
by John Kecsmar

Graphics courtesy of the author

(except where noted)

AboveGood welding practices coupled

with sound design of structural elements
go a long way in minimizing the fatigue
failure thats common in many aluminum
boats, especially those that see hard
service in rough conditions.

56 Professional BoatBuilder

reating the complex structure and

graceful curves of an aluminum
boat requires the profound transformation of flat, square, virgin plate. It
is rolled, bent, forged, bashed, scored,
heated, welded into shape, and
painted. Done incorrectly, any one of
these processes can seriously compromise the fatigue life of the resulting
structure. Such failings can be exacerbated by original designs that overlook the simple details needed to
accommodate the properties and
peculiarities of the material.
The relationship between aluminum
fabrication practices and fatigue failure
is complex. While I cannot possibly
cover all its aspects in a brief article, Ill

highlight some of the common causes

of failure in aluminum boats that are
too often overlooked during planning
and construction.
To better understand why such mistakes are made and how to correct
them, lets take a look at a common
fatigue failure in a series of high-speed
aluminum powerboats I worked on in
the early 1990s: cracking in the aluminum structure in transoms and around
waterjets.
At the time, the popularity of waterjet propulsion was booming, and with
it came a troubling rise in these
cracks. They were common enough
to almost be expected. The problems
have now been well documented and,

Figure 1. FEA Model of Transom and Waterjet

Inspection of the damaged boats

revealed classic signs of fatigue failure
around the load paths identified in
the FEA.

Fatigue

In this context, fatigue is best

described by metal fatigue expert
Basic Aluminum Fabrication
L.P. Pook: a failure of a metal under
During fabrication, steel is not
repeated or otherwise varying load
affected and/or changed to the same
which never reaches a level sufficient
degree as aluminum, but aluminum
to cause failure in a single applicahas the undeniable advantages of
tion. In simple terms: When you
light weight and resistance to corapply a force to a structural member,
rosion. So, how do we reconcile
it will bend and become stressed. So
these differences? Its important for
long as the stress from static loading
is below the materials yield stress, designers and fabricators to recognize aluminums characteristics so
the member will not fail. If you now
they of
can
maximize
its desirable
repeat this loadingFigure
many
3-1.times,
Fatigue Limits
Steel
and Aluminum
although each specific load applied properties, and avoid the sort of
failures that plagued our waterjet
does not overstress the member, the
structures and transoms.
simple repetition can initiate a failure
owing to the dynamic
or cyclic nature of the Figure 2. Fatigue Limits of Steel and Aluminum
loading.
In troubleshooting
30
our transom failures,
or any fatigue failure
27
of an aluminum boat,
theres an important distinction to be made
24
between fatigue in steel
Mild steel normalized
and fatigue in alumi21
num. Below a particular level of stress, steel
Al Cu alloy
2014A T6
reaches its fatigue
18
Endurance strength
limit. No damage or
at 50 million cycles
loss of strength will
15
occur below that
106
107
108
109
105
fatigue limit, regardEndurance (Cycles)
less of the number of
cycles (Fig. 2).
Semi-range of Stress x 10 MPa

in most cases, remedied. Builders and

operators discovered that corrective
action early on could prevent the
need for more costly repairs, which in
turn prompted more research into
these fatigue-related failures.
For the teams designing, building,
and repairing these boats, the immediate questions were: Why were the
boats cracking? And while it was clear
that the structural cracks were related
to vibration of the waterjets, engine
girders were subjected to similar vibrations: Why werent they failing, too?
Answers werent self-evident, so
before specifying effective repairs that
wouldnt repeat the problems in the
original structure, engineers were
tasked with performing a detailed
analysis of the mechanics of the failures
by applying very basic finite element
analysis (FEA). Then they straingauged a waterjet transom and structure
during sea trails to validate the FEA
model.
Today, understanding a structure
subjected to a range of stresses is
readily possible through even more
sophisticated FEA, which is often
standard at the design phase (see
FEA, Professional BoatBuilder No.
78, and Fine-tuning with FEA, PBB
No. 133). Figure 1 shows a typical
FEA model of a transom and waterjet
structure. This analysis indicated locations of higher stress, though not necessarily unacceptably high. Areas
identified on the FEA were consistent
with locations of the actual failures,
but the stresses were all below the
designed allowable yield stress of
the structure. So why did they fail?

In contrast, aluminum has no

fatigue limit. Constant exposure of
aluminum to repeated loading will
ultimately lead to failure, no matter
how low the actual stress magnitude experienced for all practical
purposes.
Faced with numerous failures, we
were beginning to think that aluminum was a poor choice for a lightweight boatbuilding material; it
seemed cursed. It turns out that
many of our problemsand those of
other builderswere caused by
applying steel design and building
methods to aluminum, a very different
metal. Steel, a forgiving material, has
been around for centuries, and the
techniques and procedures for working it are highly developed and
widely employed. As a boatbuilding
material, aluminum is just decades
old, so correct, consistent aluminumfabrication methods are not as commonly shared. It is imperative that we
teach best practices for aluminum to
fabricators, especially those who are
accustomed to building in steel.

June/July

2012

57

Quality Control

aterial-specific quality assurance (QA) is the key to

consistently successful design and construction of
aluminum boats. Whether youre the designer, the plater,
or the welder, your awareness of the alloys physical
properties and limitations is the first step in recognizing
what can compromise an aluminum structure, what can
Figure
4. Rotary-Saw
Cutting
Temperatures
and
go wrong
in build, and
ultimately
how you in
canChip
avoid
such faults. That understanding also clarifies the
necessity of different fabrication processes for steel and

aluminum, and helps you avoid the common errors

caused by not differentiating between the two materials.
You may ask, Is strict quality control really that necessary? Im only building a small yacht; wont it add time
and cost? Surely this is only for large commercial builds.
Regardless of size or complexity, once the boat enters
Plate
service, simple unforeseen vibrations from numerous
sources will expose any flaws unintentionally built into
the hull due to lack of attention to detail during design

Figure 3. Rotary-Saw Cutting Temperatures in Chip and Plate

1,256
(680)

tc = 0.036" (0.91mm)

1,274
(690)

1,292 (700)
1,310 (710)
1,328 (720)
1,328

1,238
(670)

1,346 (730)
1,364 (740)

Temperatures
F (C)
1,

1,382 (750)

1,

22

0
1, 202 (6
60
18
(
1,
6
X
16 4 (6 50 )
)
6
(6 40)
30
1,148 (620)
)

Heat

Figure 5. Effects of Notching or Scoring

Y
Z

t = 0.024" (0.61mm)

Maximum Stress (ksi)

45

Lab air

40
35

Kt = 3

30
25

Salt water

Kt = 12

20

Lab airsmooth (as-received)

300
Lab airKt = 3 edge notched
Lab airKt = 12 edge notched
Salt watersmooth
6061-T4 sheet specimens, R = 0.1
200

15

100

10
5
0

103

104

105

106

Life (Cycles)

58 Professional BoatBuilder

107

108

0
109

MPa

Figure 4. Effects of Notching or Scoring

Lets start with a few fabrication

practices that best accommodate
aluminums principal characteristics.
Avoid marking the plate with scribing tools; these leave marks on the
surfaces and can create a slight flaw
where a crack can develop and
become the site of crack initiation
under high loads. Similarly, dont
write on aluminum stock with pencil,
as the carbon in it is higher up (more
noble) on the galvanic corrosion
series.
If aluminum is too coarsely cut, its
rough surface can result in potential
sites of crack initiation. Cutting with a
rotary saw can create considerable
heat at the blade tips (Fig. 3). This
heat buildup can locally reduce the
strength of heat-treatable 6000-series
aluminum as well as annealing a
strain-hardened 5000-series non-heattreatable alloy.
Another desirable property of aluminum that differentiates it from steel
is that it requires no special tools for
bending. It is important to ensure that
the bending tools are free of irregularities, which could cause marks or
score the surface of the plate. The
effects that notching or scoring have
on aluminum are shown in Fig. 4.
Ranging from minor to major, notches
in the plate can reduce the fatigue
strength by as much as 75% from its
pristine condition.
Clearly, the way you handle,
machine, form, bend, and strike the
alloy will affect its fatigue strength.
Small steel particles from fabrication
toolssuch as a steel hammer or steel
rollerscould unintentionally be
embedded into the plate, where they
can act as a site for crack propagation
or suffer from corrosion leading to
stress-corrosion cracking. Always
ensure clean, smooth working surfaces free from contaminants.

and fabrication. And the cost of

repairing a finished and flawed vessel can equal a large percentage of
the initial build cost.
In steel construction, applying the
correct filler wire or painting the bare
metal surface to prevent obvious corrosion have become standard best
practices, so ingrained and accepted
than no one questions either the

need or the expense. This is QA at

its best. By learning and adhering
to similar rules and standard practices, and recognizing that steel and
aluminum require different approaches
that should not be universally
applied to both, the same high
quality can be achieved in aluminum construction.
John Kecsmar

Figure 5-1. Typical Properties of 5083 Alloy at Different Tempers

Shaping should be performed in the
Simple processes such as rolling and
bending will work-harden the alloy,
O temper (annealed) or H111 (another
temper designation) alloys to avoid
which in turn reduces its capacity for
deformation and load-carrying. For
excessive localized strain-hardening.

Figure 5. Typical Properties of 5083 Alloy at Different Tempers

Ultimate Tensile Strength
~330
H2 temper

Stress (MPa)

240

O temper

140

Figure 5-2. Amount of Available Overload to Base Metal

Proof Stress Limit of 5083 Alloy

Strain

% of Load Over the Base Proof Stress

Figure 6. Amount of Available Overload to Base Metal

Proof Stress Limit of 5083 Alloy
120
100
80
60
40
20
0

H2

H4

H6

Temper

H8

H9

this reason the United Kingdom

Ministry of Defense accepts only Otemper alloys, which are the softest
and most ductile. A typical value of
proof stress of 5083 alloy in the O
temper is nominally 120140 MPa
(Fig. 5). Strain-hardening the same
5083 alloy to a temper of H2 increases
this proof stress to roughly 240 MPa.
That sounds good, as the allowable
design stress limit has increased. But
closer inspection reveals that the
same strain-hardening has reduced
the margin from yield to ultimate
tensile strength (UTS), or failure.
Fig. 6 illustrates that strainhardening each temper also increases
the UTS, but at what cost? Thus, the
UTS of O temper is approximately
300330 MPa, whereas in H9 temper,
the UTS is 420. As strain hardening
increases, the percentage over the
base yield proof stress the temper can
carry, decreases. It ranges from 107%
for O temper, down to a paltry 14% in
the H9 temper.
This means that if the alloy is overloaded from its design-allowable
stress in O temper, the amount of
reserve capacity is 107%, or double
the design limitan inbuilt safety factor of 2. But in the H9 temper, for
example, the margin from yield to
overload is so small that an overload
can cause instant failure of the structural member.
In addition, O temper is easier to
bend for hull plating; and the resulting temperafter factoring in strain
hardening from rollingleaves sufficient overload capacity in the finished
hull components. With O temper, its
likely that simple rolling of hull plating can increase temper to, say, H116.
But an already strain-hardened alloy,
say H321, is significantly more difficult to roll, and once rolled is strainhardened possibly to a temper of H2
or more, depending on the curvatures complexity. This leaves little
capacity for deformation in the event
of overloading.
Some old-school fabricators will
apply the heat method common in
steel fabrication to straighten a buckled or bent aluminum plate. This is
poor practice. Heat can significantly
affect aluminums proof strength.
Even if the metal has been perfectly
handled, cut, shaped, and fixed into
position, it must still be welded. This
process alters aluminums fatigue
strength, sometimes dramatically if

June/July

2012

59

Figure 6. S-N Curves of 5000 Series Weldments

Figure 7. S-N Curves of 5000-Series Weldments

160
140

Stress (MPa)

120
100
80
60

In air

40
20

In seawater

Figure
7. Cutouts
in Main Frame
Web
100E+04
100E+05
100E+06

100E+07

100E+08

100E+09

Endurance (cycles)

Figure 8. Cutouts in Main Frame Web

R10
(0.4")

Transverse frame

R10
(0.4")

Stringer
63

R15
(0.6")

Hull plate

Figure 9. Poor Weld Return

60 Professional BoatBuilder

correct procedures are not followed.

Welding reduces fatigue properties
even further than those shown in
Figs. 2 and 4. When aluminum is
immersed in a corrosive environment
like seawater, its fatigue life is
reduced yet again, as shown in Fig. 7.
A welded joint does not have to be
immersed in seawater for its fatigue
life to be reduced. If it is wetted just
once with seawater in a bilge or
unventilated compartment, and then
dries, the effect is the same: the salt
deposits are deliquescent, meaning
that in damp conditions the salt crystals attract water in the air to form a
highly saline drop of liquid, probably
more corrosive than seawater.
Fig. 7 illustrates that when aluminum is welded, the reduction in
fatigue strength in air is approximately 50%, and when that weld is
immersed in seawater, reduction can
be as much as 90% of the static
unwelded strength. So, static design
limits appear to be rather meaningless
for a welded aluminum boat that is
constantly exposed to or immersed in
seawater. To avert failures, designers
must carefully position welded joints,
and builders must practice comprehensive quality control.

Frame Design
Proper structural analysis is always
necessary in planning a complex
structure. Incorrectly identifying load
paths in connecting structure can
cause serious problems in the framing
for aluminum boats. When a typical
stringer/longitudinal passes through a
main transverse frame, cutouts are
required so both structural members
can be continuous. The size, shape,
and connection detail of these cutouts
requires care and an understanding of
the true forces the frames will be subjected to. In Fig. 8, a typical arrangement shows an angle bar stringer,
which could just as easily be a T or a
bulb bar.
In the connection between the web
of the transverse frame and the
web of the longitudinal, seen in section, there is a 0.6" (15mm) radius.
This prevents the weld of the transverse frame web (left to right on the
page) from coming in contact with
the weld of the web of the stringer.
Thats important for two reasons:
first, to avoid locating a weld over a
weld (more on this later); second,
the weld in the frame web carries a

load transversely, and the web of the

stringer carries a load longitudinally.
When these two welds join, the weld
at the intersection is being pulled
in two directions. If a load in each
weld has a unit value of 1, then
owing to the connection, the resulting maximum load is the square root
of the triangle of forces: 2, or 1.41.
Thus, the weld at the intersection has
an increase in stress of 41% over as
designed stress. Overlay an increase
of 41% in expected stress onto Fig. 7,
and the resulting weakness and
likely failure is apparent, commonly
called a biaxial stress riser. (A triaxial
is a joint in three directions). The
size of this radius needs to ensure
that the two welds dont touch.
The weld on the frame web must
also return around and be continuous. If the cutout is an odd shape/
size, this too can increase the local
stress as a discontinuity.
An example of a poor weld return
is shown in Fig. 9. Weld returns are
important because as the shear load
in the weld runs out, the load has
nothing to pass into. (FEA can establish the structural load path to illustrate the phenomenon.) But more
importantly, the end of a weld
always has too much heat without a
runoff plate and creates a heat sink
as the weld solidifies, and eventually
leaves a classic crater, or start-stop,
crack. This is visible in the poor joint
shown in Fig. 9, as indicated by the
circle. The arrow is pointing at the
heat sink and small pore, a microscopic flaw, which eventually
becomes a crack that propagates
under repeated loading. This type of
flaw is also called a hot crack.
Shown in Fig. 10, a good return at
the ends of a joint will prevent the
heat sink, thus eliminating the flaw,
and will provide a direct path around
the joint to distribute the shear load
when the vessel is in service.
If stringers are highly loaded,
sniped ends will also exacerbate
the fabrication problem. A snipe is the
common method of finishing a structural member if an end doesnt attach
to another member. For example,
when an angle bar stops short of a
frame and its not possible to attach
a bracket to the frame, the bar is cut
back at an angle of 30. This gradually reduces the change of section,
thus lessening any stress concentration from loads in the member. The

Figure 10. Good Weld Return

Figure 11. Undressed Weld Stops

designer must ensure that the shear

and bending loads are not excessive
in any loading conditions in a snipedend structural member.

Weld Flaws
Cracks in welds are the most common fatigue failure. They are generally
the result of poor welding practice and
not performing the standard checks to
maintain quality. One of the most
common is a simple start-stop crack
initiated when too much heat is concentrated in one location for too long,
or not long enough to fully penetrate.
Considered to be too time consuming,
good welding practices are too often
abandoned when a builder is under
the pressure of production. A classic
example is when a welder makes a
long run and neglects to grind back
the stop to prevent a void (Fig. 11). If
the weld has gone cool or cold, a new
weld run on top, or if performed too
quickly, will rarely fuse deep into the
root and so leaves a voida ready-

made crack waiting to propagate.

Another common site for cracks is
the intersection of the flange of a longitudinal and the web of a transverse
frame. You can see in Fig. 8 that the
flange of the angle bar has a defined
gap between it and the frame web.
Some designers and yards leave no
gap, thinking that for a really stiff
joint its often best to weld them
together. This is incorrect. The resulting joint is very stiff; however, the
problem that manifests in service is
similar to, but worse than, the biaxial
stress riser on the lower-radius web
connection, discussed above. The
weld of the frame web is carrying
shear transversely, and the flange in
the longitudinal direction carries tensile load. The shear strength of aluminum is much less than its tensile
strength by a factor of 3; therefore,
the allowable stress that the weld can
take is reduced by 58% (1/3)the
difference between the tensile and
shear load capacity. Since the stringer

June/July

2012

61

Figure 12. Improper Joint Weld

Courtesy Lloyds Register

Figure 11. Excessive Gap Filling

Figure 13. Excessive Gap Filling

Weld toe
LOP/LOF void
Crack
Weld
Figure 12. Lack of Penetration/Lack of Fusion

Figure 14. Lack of Penetration/Lack of Fusion

Fatigue Strength (MPa)

300
200

100

Sound
welds
0.2"
(5.3mm)

RR

Size of
imperfection
and life range

RI

0.15"
(3.8mm)

50
103
D. Kosteas

0.06"
(1.5mm)

104

105
106
Cycles to Failure

RR = reinforcement removed

62 Professional BoatBuilder

0.02"
(0.5mm)
107

RI = reinforcement intact

is constantly subjected to wave loads,

it flexes with each passing wave in
this extreme fatigue environment. As
a result, the weld will crack, as shown
in Fig. 12. Again, if the designer overlaid the calculated stress, with the 3
increase at this joint, onto the graph
in Fig. 7, the implications for longevity are obvious. (While Fig. 7 shows a
drop in strength at fatigued welds of
roughly 90% in 5000-series aluminum,
the results would be slightly worse in
6000 series.)
Poor fit-up is another common
problem. If the plate is incorrectly
sized, a large gap will result when its
fitted up to the hull. Far too often, the
welder will gap-fill to make it fit. A
classic example of this is shown in
Fig. 13, a cross section of the connection of a stern tube passing through a
waterjet duct, exhibiting a large void.
The stern tube must be fitted to exact
tolerances to ensure the correct gap
for welding. Though the drawing
called for just three weld beads, or
passesa root and two capsnumerous
beads are visible on the finished and
failed structure. This excessive gapfilling led to the inevitable lack of
penetration (LOP) and lack of fusion
(LOF). Inadequate penetration means
the weld pool does not reach the
weld root, and therefore a root gap
remains. Finally, where the minimum
cross-sectional area and heat-affected
zone (HAZ) coincide, theres the
resulting fatigue crack at the weld toe
(the line where the base metal meets
the weld metal on the surface). The
stern tube shown in Fig. 13 failed
within a few months of going into
service. Despite being a small joint, it
was a very costly repair, because the
vessel had to be put in dry dock.
Poor training or just a fabricators
momentary lapse in attention necessitated this expensive correction.
Apart from being extremely
unsightly, LOP/LOF seriously impacts
the fatigue life of a welded joint, as
illustrated in Fig. 14. That graph highlights several other welding defects as
well. As the void size increases, the
number of cycles to failure decreases
significantly, as does the corresponding fatigue strength with or without
reinforcements. These unfused interfaces between filler metal and base
metal or between different layers of
the filler materialcharacterized as
fusion defects, or LOP and LOFare
difficult to detect with non-destructive

Figure 13. Linear Misalignment

Figure 15. Linear Misalignment

330
310

290
AIMgSi1/S-AISi5
t = 0.10" to 0.13" (2.5mm to 3.2mm)

270
250
0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Relative Eccentricity e/t(%)

D. Kosteas and S.J. Maddox

Stress (MPa)

testing such as dye penetrant.

Poor fit-up affects alignment as well
as gap filling. Misalignment can cause
localized stress concentrations
because the resulting weld is oversized, and also cause localized secondary bending stresses because
of discontinuity between butted
plates. The combination of these
localized effects exposes the weld toe
to higher-than-expected stress (see
Fig. 15).
The increase in secondary stresses
is related to the geometric relationship
of plate thickness and distance of misalignment. We can calculate the
increase of stress at the weld toes in
the plate by the simple relationship:

Figure 16. Crack in Oversized Weld

sN + sM = sN . (1 + 3.e/t)

The term in parentheses is the

stress-magnification factor, Km. So if,
for example, you have an axial misalignment of just 10% of the plate
thickness (e/t = 0.1), Km = 1.3. A similar increase in stress results from a 1
angular misalignment, which means
that if the plate is off by 10% and the
angle of the joint is also rotated by
just 1, these slight imperfections
combine for Km = 1 + 0.3 + 0.3 = 1.6.
Thats a 60% increase of stress at the
weld toe.
Fig. 16 shows the result of attempting to overcome the gap where a
frame rider butts into another rider
running transversely. To fill the excessive gap, the welder buttered each
edge with two passes, which cooled
and locked in stress. The weld was
finished by filling the middle with
additional weld beads achieving no
real penetration. Aluminum has
approximately five times the thermal
conductivity, and twice the rate of
thermal expansion, of steel, so the
heat from welding travels farther and
faster than in steel. The crack is
shown by the circles on either side of
the rider, and the arrows indicate the
hairline crack that has surfaced across
the weld. It cracked because the oversized volume of weld could not cool
evenly across the whole joint, which
caused internal thermal stress gradients. Thus, it cracked as it cooled.
Fig. 17 illustrates several bracket-

Figure 13. Linear Misalignment

330

Stress (MPa)

Where:
sN is axial stress
t is plate thickness
e is eccentricity

310

290
270
250

AIMgSi1/S-AISi5
t = 0.10" to 0.13" (2.5mm to 3.2mm)
10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Relative Eccentricity e/t(%)

Figure 17. Bracket-Installation Errors

June/July

2012

63

Figure 16. Rollover (Overfill) Toe Angle

Figure 18. Rollover (Overfill) Toe Angle

Stress Range (MPa)

120
100
80
60
40
20

toe

Alloy NP5/6
R=0
t = 0.37" (9.4mm)

0
100
Figure
17. Effects of120
Weld Dressing 140
on Fatigue
Toe Angle

160

180

Figure 19. Effects of Weld Dressing on Fatigue

250
Fatigue Strength (MPa)

Aluminum and the Sea/Pechiney Rhenalu Handbook

base metal
200
Rollover (overfill)
dressed flush

150
100
50

Butt weld
5000-series alloy

as welded

0 18. Effect of Repairs on Grain Size

Figure
103
4 6 104
4 6 105
4 6 106 2

5 107 2

5 108

Cycles to Failure

Figure 20. Effect of Repairs on Grain Size

95
90

Grain Size (m)

S. Katsas, J. Nikolaou, and G. Papadimitriou

85

Root pass
Face pass

80
75
70
65
60
55
50
0
(as welded)

64 Professional BoatBuilder

Number of Repairs

installation errors. The crack circled

in red is the most obvious one. It was
caused by the lack of a proper weld
return, which led to too much heat at
the ends as the welder stopped,
which in turn pulled the joint as it
cooled. To the left of the crack, the
welder gap-filled to overcome bad
fit-up. You also can just see a hard
saw cut, indicated by the arrow, in
the bracket material. This hard edge
will also crack.
Gaps and misalignment aside, oversized or misshapen welds on their
own are sources of local discontinuity. The stress in a typical weld varies
from the nominal stresswhat you
expect the weld to carryto a much
higher peak at the weld toe. How this
affects the fatigue life is shown in
Fig. 18. Within a window of likely
weld profiles, the lower the toe angle
(meaning the more rollover), the
lower the load the weld can carry. As
the allowable stress is lower, so too
is the fatigue life.
If we look at the profile of a butt
weld as a discontinuity, it shortens the
fatigue life of a structure. Fabricators
can minimize the effect by dressing
the weld bead, which reshapes the weld
toe to eliminate rollover. The curves
shown in Fig. 19 clearly illustrate that
an as-welded joint, which shows the
weld bead profile untouched, has a
much lower load-carrying capacity,
and thus a shorter fatigue life, than a
dressed weld or the virgin plate.
Welding over a weld, and rewelding
existing welds owing to mistakes and/
or replacing plate, are far-too-common
poor practices. When subjected to a
typical UTS bend test, these joints
show undesirable effects on the grain
size. Fig. 20 shows an increase in
grain size of 33% by the fourth repair.
Hardness is proportional to yield
strength, so as grain size increases,
hardness decreases, which in turn
reduces strength.
The effect of multiple welding
repairs on mechanical strength is
quantified in Fig. 21. As weld repairs
increase, UTS consistently falls below
accepted standards.
Weld temperatures in the heataffected zone typically range from
932F to 1,112F (500C to 600C). At
these temperatures, fine particles
called intermetallicssuch as
Al6(MnFe) or Al6Mn and Al3Fe
precipitate from the alloy, and are no
longer soluble once the weld cools.

The increase in grain growth shown

in Fig. 20 is consistent with the
increase in intermetallics and porosity
sites of crack initiationcaused by
repeated exposure to welding temperatures. Welding over a weld increases
the grain size and the number of
intermetallics inside the alloy with
each thermal cycle. This has the effect
of greatly reducing strength and the
fatigue life of the welded joint, and
expanding the weakened area around
a weld. The specific influence on
fatigue life owing to the increase of
intermetallics can be as much as a 30%
reduction, and porosity alone can
reduce the fatigue life by as much as
200 times, with increasing flaw size
(Fig. 22). In repairs, the welder should
always cut out the heat-affected zone
to avoid the cumulative degradation of
the metal from repeated welding.

Figure 21. Effects of Welding Repairs on Mechanical Strength

Solutions

Figure 22. Effects of Porosity on Fatigue Life

ASM Handbook safety limit

Ultimate Tensile Strength

280
270
260
250
240
230
220
210

200
0
2
Figure 21. Effects
of
Porosity 1
(as welded)
Number of Repairs

106

Butt weld with rollover

dressed flush

105
Cycles to Fracture

In repairing the original failure

in our waterjet-powered vessel, we
identified the fabrication faults that
initiated fatigue-related failures in its
complex stern structure. With FEA we
found the locations of the load paths
that the original design and fabrication had failed to identify as sources
of potential failures that could result
in cracking (Fig. 23). By applying
best practices in aluminum to the next
generation of waterjet-powered vessels, we have avoided those faults in
fabrication.
We introduced more transverse
frames in the detail design, so we
could then reduce or completely eliminate longitudinals in the affected
region. This provided easy access,
so the welder could make one continuous weld, thereby limiting the
start-stops that introduce so much
potential for cracking. With no longitudinals or need for cutouts through
structural members, all the connections
were smoothed, minimizing welding
discontinuities.
During fabrication, builders now
roll the plate with more care and
attention, and along the grain rather
than across the grain. Where feasible, we introduced post-weld treatment to dress welds, reducing the
stress concentrations at the weld
toes (Fig. 24), which has been
shown to improve the fatigue life.
The application of the new waterjet
structure design and fabrication philosophies were fully adopted on a class of

290

Factor of ~200
on life

104
103
102
10

Respective increase of net section stress

in the order of 50%

100

16

24

32

Porosity in % of Fracture Area

Figure 23. Load Paths

June/July

2012

65

Figure 24. Post-weld Treatment of Flange-Welded Joint of Jet Duct

Figure 24. Post-Weld Treatment of Flange-Welded

Joint of Jet Duct
0.4" (10mm)
machining allowance

Figure 25. Waterjet Duct

Back face flange

1"
(25mm)

Holes drilled in
conjunction with
KaMeWa flange

760

R8

14

0.04"

(1mm)

20.0
min

Depth of grinding
to be 0.02" (0.5mm)
below bottom of any
visible weld

0.05"
(1.25mm)
Scale 1:1

66 Professional BoatBuilder

147.6' (45m), 200-metric-ton, 45-knot vessels. Twenty-three

metric tons of water per second pass through the waterjet
duct shown in Fig. 25. To the best of my knowledge, the
boats have not experienced a single structural failure
of the transom around the waterjets in their 17 years of
service of 1216 hour days, seven days a week. The same is
true of the smaller repaired waterjet structure highlighted
at the beginning of the article.
This evidence justifies the close attention to detail that took
place during design and fabrication to ensure that a
structure will be trouble-free for its lifetime. In all the waterjetpowered vessels I have designed during the past 17 years, I

have found that establishing correct

procedures and sticking to them are
the keys to a long-lived and warrantyfree vessel.
About the Author: John Kecsmar
formed the marine consultancy company Ad Hoc Marine Designs Ltd with
Nigel Warren in 2005, after spending
nearly 20 years together at FBM
Babcock Marine, in Newport, United
Kingdom. John is on Lloyds Register
Technical Committee, RINAs High
Speed technical committee, MCAs
High Speed Advisory Group, and
SNAMEs O-50 Maritime Quality
Culture Group. He has designed highspeed aluminum vessels such as
patrol boats, fast ferries, SWATHs, and
crew boats for more than 20 years
and is the author of many technical
papers on high-speed design, structural
design, and fatigue. He lives in Japan.
John dedicates this article to his friend
and mentor, Nigel Warren, who died
during its preparation. John writes
that Nigel was very generous with his
encyclopedic knowledge of boats, and
is sadly missed.

Further Reading
For in-depth study of fatigue failures and aluminum boat construction, we
include a list of the authors technical papers and other sources he credits
for this article.
Katsas, S., J. Nikolaou, G. Papadimitriou. Microstructural changes accompanying repair welding in 5XXX aluminum alloys and their effect on the mechanical
properties, Materials & Design, Vol. 27, Issue 10, Elsevier, 2006.
Kecsmar, Fyfe, Hawkins, Shenoi, Price, Temarel, Read. Fatigue Performance of
Welded Aluminum Tee Connections, FAST 1997.
Kecsmar, J. Guidance on How Weld Quality Influences the Fatigue Life of
Welded Aluminum Structures, JASNAOE Conf., Vol. 3, Nov. 2006.
Kecsmar, J., R.A. Shenoi. Some Notes on the Influence of Manufacturing on the
Fatigue Life of Welded Aluminum Structures, Journal of Ship Production,
Vol. 20, No. 3, SNAME, August 2004.
Kecsmar, J., N. Warren, J. Moore. The evolution of advanced SLICE
Technology adapted to satisfy the HSC Code and commercial requirements,
RINA H.S.A.M.V. Conference, Shanghai, China, April 6, 2007.
Kecsmar, J., N. Warren, N. Sims. Waterjet Propulsion: A Shipbuilders View,
RINA Conference, London, U.K., December 12, 1994.
Kosteas, D. Fatigue Behaviour and Analysis, Lecture 2401, Advanced Level,
Training in Aluminum Application Technologies, European Aluminum
Association, 1994.
Maddox, S.J. Fatigue Strength of Welded Structures. Abington Publishing, 2nd
Ed, 1991, ISBN-10 1 85573 013 8.
Panico, J.R. The effect of multiple weld repairs on the fatigue resistance of
welded aluminum alloy 5083-O, NTIS, Dec. 1979.
Pechiney Rhenalu Handbook. Aluminum and the Sea, 1993.
Polezhaeva, H., M. Malinowski. Fatigue Strength of Aluminum Structural Details
of Special Service Craft, FAST 2001, Southampton, U.K.

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2012

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