Systems and methods to simulate joining operations

A computer-implemented system for simulating a weld bead formed by joining materials, with or without filler material, the system comprising:

• processing circuitry;
• a physical workpiece;
• a physical joining tool;
• one or more image sensors configured to capture images of the physical workpiece and the physical joining tool corresponding to a joining operation;
• and
• a machine readable storage device storing machine readable instructions which, when executed by the processing circuitry, cause the processing circuitry to:
• define a plurality of slice sampling intervals depending on a desired precision;
• define a slice plane according to a desired orientation with respect to a weld trajectory;
• display a visual simulation of a three-dimensional joining operation within a simulation domain by simulating the weld bead in the simulation domain as a set of rendered interconnected cross-sectional slices;
• wherein said slices are oriented according to the defined slice plane along the weld trajectory;
• wherein the slices are two-dimensional and have a width equivalent to a distance between the defined sampling intervals;
• and wherein the simulation domain is based on images of the physical workpiece and the physical joining tool captured by the image sensors.