Preliminary Study on the Feasibility of Electrically Assisted Direct Joining of Titanium and PEEK

The present study introduces an electrically assisted direct joining process for hybrid metal-polymer connections. The process consists of the adoption of an electrical current to heat the metal component, which is pressed against a thermoplastic polymer. Titanium grade 2 and Polyetheretherketone were selected for the preliminary testing campaign. An instrumented equipment was developed to control and measure the main process parameters such as the voltage and the current during the joining process. The investigation was carried out to determine the feasibility of the process. To this end, preliminary experimental tests were performed by varying the main process parameters. The metal surface's laser texturing was performed before joining to promote micromechanical interlocking. Quality assessment of the connections was carried out through single lap shear tests and fracture surface analysis.