Methods to fabricate fully enclosed hollow structures using friction stir welding
AssigneeMegastir Technologies LLC
InventorsRussell Kingston, Murray Mahoney, Russell J. Steel, Scott M. Packer
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method is taught for creating a hollow sphere that is created by joining two cylinders together that have a semispherical hollow formed in the ends being joined together, wherein a metallic reinforcing disk is inserted at an interface between the two ends of the cylinders, wherein the two cylinders and reinforcing disk are joined using friction stir welding to create an inner sphere from the two hemispherical hollows that is bisected by the metallic reinforcing disk, and wherein the joined cylinders and reinforcing disk are machined to thereby create an outer spherical surface that is centered around the inner sphere.
Claims31
A method for creating a hollow assembly that is bisected by a reinforcing metallic disk using friction stir welding:
- 1) providing two cylinders, each cylinder having a joining end that forms a hollow;
- 2) placing the two joining ends of the two cylinders to form a joint, with a reinforcing metallic disk inserted therebetween;
- 3) friction stir welding around the two cylinders at the joint to thereby join the two cylinders and the reinforcing metallic disk, wherein a hollowed out inner space is now created at an interface of the two cylinders, with the reinforcing metallic disk bisecting the inner space;
- and
- 4) machining the two cylinders to form a hollow assembly that is centered around the inner space and the reinforcing metallic disk.
A method for creating a hollow assembly using diffusion bonding:
- 1) providing two cylinders, each cylinder having a joining end that forms a hollow, and a non-joining end;
- 2) disposing a plurality of concentric grooves on the joining end of each of the two cylinders;
- 3) placing the joining ends of the two cylinders together to form a joint and a hollow inner space defined by the two hollows of the two cylinders;
- 4) diffusion bonding the two cylinders at the joint;
- and
- 5) machining the two cylinders to form a hollow assembly that is centered around the hollow inner space.
A hollow metallic assembly that is manufactured using friction stir welding, said hollow metallic assembly comprised of:
- two cylinders, each cylinder having a joining end that forms a hollow, wherein the two cylinders are comprised of materials that are unweldable using conventional welding methods, and wherein the two cylinders are disposed against each other to form a joint at the joining ends;
- a reinforcing metallic disk disposed between the two cylinders at the joining ends, wherein a hollowed out inner space is created at an interface of the two cylinders with the reinforcing metallic disk bisecting the inner space, wherein the two cylinders and the reinforcing metallic disk are joined using friction stir welding at the joint, and wherein the two cylinders form a hollow assembly that is centered around the inner space.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.