The purpose of this study is to determine fracture toughness of Resistance Spot Welded (RSW) Dual Phase (DP) steels. RSW of galvanized and ungalvanized DP 450 steel sheets was carried out on spot welding machine. Fracture toughness of RSW joints of galvanized and ungalvanized DP 450 steel sheets was calculated from tensile-shear tests. New empirical equations were developed using Least Squares Method (LSM) between energy release rate, fracture toughness and critical crack size depending on the

more »

... elationship between hardness and fracture toughness values. Results indicated that fracture toughness of joints welded by using RSW increased exponentially while the hardness decreased. In addition, fracture toughness and energy release rate of RSW galvanized DP 450 steel sheets were lower compared to RSW ungalvanized DP 450 steel sheets which had approximately the same hardness. Citation / Cómo citar este artículo: Sevim, I. (2016) "An experimental study on fracture toughness of resistance spot welded galvanized and ungalvanized DP 450 steel sheets used in automotive body". Rev. Metal. 52 (3):e072. doi: http:// dx.doi.org/10.3989/revmetalm.072. PALABRAS CLAVE: Aceros dual (DP); Fatiga; Resistencia soldada por puntos (RSW); Tenacidad a la fractura Copyright: © 2016 CSIC. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-by) Spain 3.0.