BUTT WELDING

INSTRUCTIONS
Butt welding with contact heating elements is the process of jointing two elements
(pipes and/or fittings) of the same diameter and thickness, the joining surfaces of
which are heated until fusion by contact with a heating element and then, after the
heating element has been removed, are pressed together to form the weld.
The following instructions are provided for reference purposes only. Installers must
be properly trained and have an in-depth knowledge of the procedures to be fol-
lowed according to the type of welding equipment being used.

PRELIMINARY CHECKS BEFORE WELDING

To ensure the joint is made properly:
• Ambient temperatures must be within the range from +5 °C to +40 °C.
• When inspecting the elements to be welded together, check the dimensions (check
for excess ovality)
• Check the working temperature of the heating element with a calibrated contact
thermometer. This measurement must be made 10 minutes after the rated tempera-
ture has been reached, thus allowing the element to heat up over its entire surface
area and depth. Fusion temperature must be between 200° C and 220° C.
• Check the surface of the heating element (integrity of the non-stick coating) and
clean with a lint-free cloth or soft paper wipe.
• Check that the welding unit is functioning correctly.
• Check the efficiency of the welding unit jaw clamps; ensure they are able to guar- Fig. 1
antee the correct alignment between the two sides of the joint and that the con-
tact surfaces are perfectly parallel.
• Check the pulling force of the carriage, both in terms of friction and in relation to
the load to be moved (pipes or fittings).
• Check the efficiency of the measuring instruments (pressure gauge and timer).
• Check that the pipes and/or fittings to be welded together are of the same diam-
eter and thickness (same SDR).

PREPARING FOR WELDING

• Cleaning the surfaces:
Before positioning the parts to be welded, remove all traces of dirt, grease, oil,
dust, etc., from the external and internal surfaces of the ends, using a clean, lint-
free cloth soaked in a suitable detergent. When choosing the type of liquid deter-
gent, use recommended products supplied by specialist producers: trichloroethane, Fig. 2
chlorothene, ethyl alcohol and isopropyl alcohol are all suitable.
• Clamping the ends:
The ends of the two parts to be welded must be clamped in such a way that axial
misalignment does not exceed 10% of the thickness (fig. 1).
• Planing the edges to be welded:
To guarantee proper parallelism and flatness, and, equally important, to eliminate
the film of oxide that forms, the ends of the two parts to be joined must be planed.
When this procedure is concluded, bring the two ends into contact and ensure
that any clearances between them do not exceed 0.5 mm. The shavings must form
continuously on both the edges to be welded (fig. 2). It is good practice, after the
planing stage, to inspect the resulting shavings to verify the absence of manufac-
turing defects. Shavings must be removed from the internal surface of the com-
ponents to be welded using a brush or a clean cloth. In any event, after planing,
the two surfaces must not be touched or contaminated in any other way; for this
reason the welding operations must be performed immediately after preparation. If

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 Fig. 3
any traces of dust have settled on the planed surfaces, before they can be welded
they should be cleaned with a cloth soaked in specific detergent.

BUTT WELDING PROCEDURE

The butt fusion welding of pipes and/or fittings using contact heating elements
must be performed by carrying out all the steps in the welding cycle, as described in
the "Welding Cycle" table.
• Contact and preheating:
In this step, the two edges to be welded are located against the heating element
at a pressure equal to p1+pt, for the necessary time, with the purpose of creating a
uniform internal and external lip (fig. 3). The pressure value p1 must be such that,
when in contact with the heating element, the surfaces to be welded are subject-
ed to a pressure of 0.1 N/mm2; to achieve this condition, p1 pressure values must
be taken from the tables supplied by manufacturer of the fusion jointing machine,
because, apart from the diameter and thickness of the elements to be welded, Fig. 4
these values also depend on the cross section of the thrust cylinder in the welder
circuit and can therefore alter in accordance with the specific model of welding
unit you are using.
The symbol pt indicates the pulling pressure required to overcome the friction of-
fered by the welding unit and the weight of the pipe locked in the mobile guide,
combining to impede the free movement of the guide. This reading is taken on the
pressure gauge supplied with the machine, while moving the mobile guide (fig. 4).
In any event, it must never be higher than the pressure value p1, otherwise it may
prove necessary to use carriages or suspension systems to facilitate movement of
the pipe.
• Heating:
After the lip has formed, the pressure is lowered (10% of the contact and preheat-
ing value), thus allowing the material to heat up uniformly through its entire depth.
• Removing the heating element:
This phase must be performed as rapidly as possible, detaching the pipe edges
to be welded from the heating element, extracting the element without damaging Fig. 5
the softened surfaces and then immediately bringing the two edges to be welded
into contact with each other. This procedure must be performed quickly to avoid
the risk of excessive cooling of the edges (surface temperature falls by 17 °C in
just 3 seconds)
• Jointing build-up period:
The two edges are brought into contact and the relative pressure is increased pro-
gressively to the value (p5+pt), where p5=p1 and pt is the pulling pressure (fig. 5).
• Welding:
Welding pressure must be maintained for time t5 (fig. 6).
• Cooling:
Once the joint has been welded, contact pressure is removed and the joined parts
can be removed from the fusion jointing machine, although it must not be sub-
jected to mechanical stress until it has cooled completely. Cooling time must be at
least the same as welding time t5.

Fig. 6

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WELDING CYCLE

PRESSURE

TIME

Contact and Heating Removing the Jointing Welding Cooling

preheating heating element build-up period p=0.10 N/mm2

Minimum Contact Preheating Heating element Jointing Welding time

pipe bead height time removal time max. build-up period

(mm) (mm) (sec) (sec) (sec) (min)

... - 4.5 0.5 ... - 135 5 6 6
4.5 - 7 0.5 135 - 175 5-6 6-7 6 - 12
7 - 12 1 175 - 245 6-7 7 - 11 12 - 20
12 - 19 1 245 - 330 7-9 11 - 17 20 - 30
19 - 26 1.5 330 - 400 9 - 11 17 - 22 30 - 40
26 - 37 2 400 - 485 11 - 14 22 - 32 40 - 55
37 - 50 2.5 485 - 560 14 - 17 32 - 43 55 - 70

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CHECKING THE QUALITY OF THE WELDED JOINT
Joints can be checked using two alternative techniques: non-destructive tests and de-
structive tests. While these latter tests call for the use of special equipment, the quality
of the joint can also be checked with a simple visual inspection.
Visual inspections should assess the following points:
a) The weld bead must be uniform around the entire circumference of the joint;
b) The notch in the centre of the bead must remain above the outside diameter of the
welded parts;
c) The external surface of the bead must not show any signs of porosity or inclusions of
dust or other contaminants;
d) There should be no visible signs of surface breakup;
e) The surface of the weld bead should not have a very highly reflective finish, as this is
a sign of overheating;
f) Axial misalignment of the welded parts must be no greater than 10% of their thickness.

MOST COMMON DEFECTS

The table reports the most common types of defect encountered if the correct welding
procedure is not followed.

Irregular path of the weld bead around the circumference of the pipe
Possible causes Insufficiently meticulous preparation of ends to be welded
with consequent uneven heat distribution

Reduced size of weld bead

Possible causes Incorrect adjustment of welding parameters (temperature,
pressure and time)

Notch in centre of bead is too deep

Possible causes Temperature or pressure values are too low

Inclusions in the surface of the weld bead

Possible causes Insufficient cleaning of the ends to be welded

Porosity of weld bead

Possible causes Welding performed in excessively humid ambient conditions

Surface of weld bead presents an excessively smooth shiny finish

Possible causes Overheating during welding

Misalignment exceeds 10% of the thickness of the pipe and the fitting
Possible causes Incorrectly executed centring or excessive ovality of pipe

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COMPATIBILITY AND SAFETY FACTORS
PP-H components can be welded to compatible components in PPR and PPB without
problems, once that the compatibility of the MFI value according to the DVS standard
is verified. Because of the difference between PP-H and PPR in terms of MRS (MRS10
for PP-H, MRS8 for PPR, where MRS or Minimum Required Strength is the minimum
guaranteed breaking strength of the material, subjected to tangential tension using
hydrostatic pressure, at a temperature of 20 °C and for a lifetime of 50 years) and the
consequent safety factors to be adopted (Table 1), exact correspondence of the wall
thickness / outside diameter ratio is of the maximum importance.
For this purpose, both the SDR (Standard Dimension Ratio) and the Series of thickness-
es S have been introduced. In accordance with standard EN ISO 15494-1, the safety fac-
tor to be adopted and the SDR/Series determine the reference nominal pressure value
PN (PN: max. working pressure in bar at 20 °C, for a duration of 50 years, in water).

SAFETY FACTORS
Working temperature Safety factor

10 °C < t < 40 °C 1.6

40 °C < t < 0 °C 1.4
t > 60 °C 1.25

d MRS (SDR - 1) σ
SDR = __ σ = ____ ISO-S = ________ PN = ______
s c 2 ISO-S

SDR ISO - S Safety factor

11 5 1.6
17.6 8.3 1.6

WALL THICKNESS
Wall thickness S (mm)
d
SDR 11 - ISO S 5 SDR 17.6 - ISO S 8.3
20 1.9 -
25 2.3 -
32 2.9 1.8
40 3.7 2.3
50 4.6 2.9
63 5.8 3.6
75 6.8 4.3
90 8.2 5.1
110 10 6.3
125 11.4 7.1
140 12.7 8.0
160 14.6 9.1
180 16.4 10.2
200 18.2 11.4
225 20.5 12.8
250 22.7 14.2
280 25.4 15.9
315 28.6 17.9
355 32.2 20.1
400 36.3 22.7
450 40.9 25.5
500 - 28.4
560 - 31.7
630 - 35.7
710 - 40.2
800 - 45.3

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