Elimination Back Gouging Operation in Submerged Arc Welding Butt without Chamfers ASTM A516 (TECHNICAL NOTE)

Submerged arc welding is used widely in oil and gas industry construction for storage tanks, pressure vessels, shipbuilding and etc. One of the processes of submerged arc welding is back gouging operations. This paper presents a way to remove the back gouging operation from the submerged arc welding process. For this purpose, effects of submerged arc welding parameters onA516-70steel sample were investigated. 16 and18mm thickness sheets without chamfering were prepared and by choosing the best parameters welded from face and back. Also the effects of stress-relief heat treatment and preheat were investigated. Microstructure and mechanical properties were in standard situation and shows the performance of this project. Removing the back gouging operation significantly reduced the cost, time and also reduced noise and environment pollution in submerged arc welding process. With eliminating back gouging practice few observed an 80% decrease in costs and also decrease in environmental and acoustic pollutions.