This chapter provides basic engineering information on aluminum alloys with an emphasis on their use in applications where weight is a significant design factor. It discusses the advantages and limitations of various types of aluminum along with their compositions, designations, and achievable strengths. It explains how some alloys are hardened through solution strengthening and cold working, while others are strengthened by precipitation hardening. It also describes production and fabrication processes such as melting, casting, rolling, forging, forming, extruding, heat treating, and joining, and includes a section on the causes and effects of corrosion and how they are typically controlled.

Titanium is a lightweight metal used in a growing number of applications for its strength, toughness, stiffness, corrosion resistance, biocompatibility, and high-temperature operating characteristics. This chapter discusses the applications, metallurgy, properties, compositions, and grades of commercially pure titanium and alpha and near-alpha, alpha-beta, and beta titanium alloys. It describes primary and secondary fabrication processes, including melting, forging, forming, heat treating, casting, machining, and joining as well as powder metallurgy and direct metal deposition. It also compares and contrasts the properties of wrought, cast, and powder metal titanium products and discusses corrosion behaviors.

This article discusses the role of alloying in the production and use of carbon and low-alloy steels. It explains how steels are defined and selected based on alloy content and provides composition and property data for a wide range of designations and grades. It describes the effect of alloying on structure and composition and explains how alloy content can be controlled to optimize properties and behaviors such as ductility, strength, toughness, fatigue and fracture resistance, and resistance to corrosion, wear, and high-temperature creep. It also examines the effect of alloying on processing characteristics such as hardenability, formability, weldability, machinability, and temper embrittlement. In addition, the article provides an extensive amount of engineering data with relevance in materials selection.

This article examines the composition and properties of magnesium and its alloys. It discusses alloy and temper designations, applications and product forms, and commercial alloy systems, and explains how alloying elements affect physical and mechanical properties, processing characteristics, and corrosion behaviors.

This article discusses the composition, properties, and behaviors of copper and its alloys. It begins with an overview of the characteristics, applications, and commercial grades of wrought and cast copper. It then discusses the role of alloying, explaining how zinc, tin, aluminum, silicon, and nickel affect the physical and mechanical properties of coppers and high-copper alloys as well as brasses, bronzes, copper-nickels, and nickel silvers. It also explains how alloying affects electrical conductivity, corrosion resistance, stress-corrosion cracking, and processing characteristics.

This chapter covers the welding characteristics of titanium along with the factors that determine which welding method is most appropriate for a given application. It discusses the joinability of titanium alloys, the effect of heat on microstructure, the cause of various defects, and the need for contaminant-free surfaces and atmospheres. It describes common forms of fusion, arc, and solid-state welding along with the use of filler metals, shielding gases, and stress-relief treatments. It also discusses the practice of titanium brazing and the role of filler metals.

This article describes the repair of weld defects and failed structures. It provides information on three factors that must first be considered before attempting a repair, namely material weldability, nature of the failure that prompted the repair, and involvement of any code requirements. The article discusses the processes involved in welding process selection and the methods of preparing base metal for repair welding. It presents the guidelines for weld repairs of various ferrous (carbon steels, cast irons, and stainless steels) and nonferrous (for example, titanium) base metals.

Stainless steel base metals and the welding filler metals used with them are chosen on the basis of suitable corrosion resistance for the intended application. This article describes several constitution diagrams that that have been developed to predict microstructures and properties. This is followed by discussions of weldability, cracking, and the engineering properties of stainless steel welds, namely martensitic stainless steels, ferritic stainless steel welds, austenitic stainless steels, and duplex stainless steels.

This article discusses the fusion welding processes that are most widely used for joining titanium, namely, gas-tungsten arc welding, gas-metal arc welding, plasma arc welding, laser-beam welding, and electron-beam welding. It describes several important and interrelated aspects of welding phenomena that contribute to the overall understanding of titanium alloy welding metallurgy. These factors include alloy types, weldability, melting and solidification effects on weld microstructure, postweld heat treatment effects, structure/mechanical property/fracture relationships, and welding process application.

Nickel-base alloys are generally used in harsh environments that demand either corrosion resistance or high-temperature strength. This article first describes the general welding characteristics of nickel-base alloys. It then describes the weldability of solid-solution nickel-base alloys in terms of grain boundary precipitation, grain growth, and hot cracking in the heat-affected zone; fusion zone segregation and porosity; and postweld heat treatments. Next, the article analyzes the welding characteristics of dissimilar and clad materials. This is followed by sections summarizing the various types and general weldability of age-hardened nickel-base alloys. The article then discusses the composition, welding metallurgy, and properties of cast nickel-base superalloys. Finally, it provides information on the welding of dissimilar metals, filler metal selection for welding clad materials and for overlay cladding, service conditions during repair, and welding procedural idiosyncrasies of cobalt-base alloys.

This article discusses the weldability and fusion weld properties of refractory metal alloys. The alloys discussed include tantalum, niobium, rhenium, molybdenum, and tungsten.

This appendix provides reference tables listing weldability of cast irons, steels, and nonferrous metals. A process selection table for arc welding carbon steels is included, and recommended preheat and interpass temperature tables are also presented. This appendix includes information on qualification codes and standards.

This chapter covers the basics of weldability of cast steels such as carbon and low alloy steels, corrosion-resistant high alloy steels, nickel-base alloys, heat-resistant high alloy steels, and wear-resistant high austenitic manganese steels. It provides an overview of weld overlay and hard facing; cast-weld construction; and plasma arc cutting and plasma arc welding. The chapter discusses different types of welding processes. These include shielded metal-arc welding, air carbon arc cutting process, gas tungsten-arc welding, gas metal-arc welding process, flux-cored arc welding, submerged arc welding, and electroslag and electro-gas welding.