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ASAP is an R&D project supported by the french research agency “Agence Nationale de la Recherche” (ANR).

ASAP aims at enhancing security assembly control during manufacturing, thanks to the use of a non destructive testing system inside the plant, which will deliver a reliable, quick and simple view of the spot weld integrity.

The project will set a new phased-array ultrasonic control method with an innovative but simple-to-use aspect, combining sensor, device, and real-time algorithms developments fully integrated in the equipment.

The expected result is to implement a new equipment dedicated to the quality control people in the plant, and able to adapt instantaneously to the external geometry of the spot weld.

To this end, the following locks will be overcame:

• Development of an ultrasonic sensor small regarding the size of the controlled surface
• Development and implementation of real-time adaptive algorithms
• Integration of an automated diagnosis for plant control
• Correlation between NDT criteria and mechanical resistance of spot welds
• Macroscopic modelization to predict spot weld crash resistance

The ASAP consortium is composed of the following partners:

The project will last 3 years (2011-2014) and represents a total investment of 2026,9k€. The project is supported by the ANR (Agence Nationale de la Recherche) for an amount of 844,6k€.

Motivations for this project:

When a road accident happens, the structure of the vehicle is designed to absorb a part of the energy released by the shock, the objective being to protect as much as possible the occupants of the vehicle. The quality of the assembly, and more particularly the spot welds, is a key stake to ensure the absorption of the energy by deformation of the parts and rupture of fusible points.

Moreover, being subject to a high competitiveness and in the context of respect for the environment, the automotive insutry must innovate to offer technological breakthroughs, and also to optimize the conception and the fabrication of the vehicles.

The weight lightening of the vehicles is one of the keys to answering to these stakes, knowing that such a technical orientation must put up with excellence performances regarding automotive security.

The desired level of mastery requires the use of an ambitious quality insurance approach. This approach relies on a quality of control up to this this ambition, and on the acquisition of a stronger expertise in this field. However, carrying out non-destructive inspection methods remains difficult, because the profile of the spot welds shows a variability typical of the industrial process.

This difficulty results in significant control times, and a long to acquire expertise level and know-how, making it hard to deal with skill availability.

ASAP will answer these challenges by developing a new methodology in non destructive testing, allowing an optimized monitoring of the assemblies. The objective of ASAP will be to study and develop a new phase-array ultrasonic method.

One of the innovations of the project will be to implement within this instrumentation dedicated algorithms, allowing to adapt in real-time to the complex geometry of the spot weld, to improve the performances of detection, and to have an automatic interpretation of the quality of the spot weld without need for expertise.

In addition, a big part of the project will be devoted to the development and the reliability of a macroscopic model of dynamic behavior of the spot welds. This model, coupled with the simulation tools of the non-destructive testing method, will make possible the validation and the optimization of the methodology for a large range of characteristic parameters of the assemblies and spot welds.

The expertise of the ASAP consortium in complementary fields of research will make possible to lead, at the end of the project, to the creation of the first apparatus of the market ensuring reliable, fast and simple evaluation of the quality of the spot welds.