A Uniformed Calculation Criterion on Heat Band Width of Local PWHT on Welded Joint with Dissimilar Thickness

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Article "A uniformed calculation criterion on heat band width of local PWHT on welded joint with dissimilar thickness" by Y. Zhang, J. Xie and Y. Luo.

The paper investigates local post-weld heat treatment, and the purpose of the research is to optimize the parameters of such treatment, aimed at reducing the level of residual thermal stresses and deformations in welded structures with different wall thicknesses. As far as it follows from the paper materials, welds obtained by arc multi-pass welding are investigated. The paper is quite interesting, easy to read, the idea of the research is clear and well stated in the article. There are a number of comments to the manuscript, which are recommended to be corrected before publication.

Important notes:

1. There is confusion with the materials under study in the article. Section 2.1 indicates that the study is carried out on SA738Gr.B steel. First of all, it is necessary to give a chemical composition of this steel in order to understand its structure. Judging by information from open sources, this is a low-alloyed pearlitic steel. Further in Section 2.3, steel 316L appears - steel of the austenitic class. It is not clear why the steel has changed? Is this filler material for the seam? Or is it a mistake?

Further, in Figure 6 and Table 3, the stress-strain curves and the results of determining the mechanical properties for steel SA738Gr.B are presented. If so, is there an error in determining the strains on the curves? Is it hard to believe that pearlite steel has an elongation to rupture of 70% at 20°C. What specimen geometry was used in these tests? How was Young's modulus determined at such high temperatures? This is important because, as far as it follows from the paper, the data on the temperature dependences of stresses and strains were put into the model, and then the values of the resulting stresses and strains of the product after heat treatment were calculated from these data.

2. Are there data on model verification for at least one case under study?

Other notes and recommendations:

3. There is a formula in the Abstract. If the authors want to provide the formula in the Abstract, then they should also give a decoding of the parameters HB, k, R and T.

4. Lines 120-122 represent heating and cooling data. From what considerations were such heating and cooling rates chosen in the indicated temperature ranges?

5. Figure 3 shows “main” and “auxiliary” heatings. Are these two different heat treatments? Why is there only one curve in the figure?

6. What temperature dependence of Poisson's ratio is used in the model? How does it change when heated?

7. In equation (5), the parameter ε^th is not deciphered.

8. Misprints are seen in line 75 (I instead of II), line 109 (ff duplicated twice), line 154 (h-1), line 178 (radical).

9. In Figure 7 and following, there is no interpretation of the S22, S33, etc. designations.

10. Conclusion #4 in the “Conclusions” section. The formula proposed by the authors involves only the geometric parameters of the structure (wall thickness, radius, ...), and does not involve the thermal characteristics of the material. Obviously, the formula is not universal, and is applicable only to one steel grade or group of steels. It is necessary to mention this in the Conclusions and Abstract.

 ___

I believe that the paper should be reviewed again after the authors have worked on these comments and recommendations.

Author Response

Dear reviewer 1,

Thanks very much for very good constructive criticism and comments on our paper. We have modified the manuscript accordingly, and the detailed comments are responded as follows:

Comments from reviewer 1:

1. There is confusion with the materials under study in the article. Section 2.1 indicates that the study is carried out on SA738Gr.B steel. First of all, it is necessary to give a chemical composition of this steel in order to understand its structure. Judging by information from open sources, this is a low-alloyed pearlitic steel. Further in Section 2.3, steel 316L appears - steel of the austenitic class. It is not clear why the steel has changed? Is this filler material for the seam? Or is it a mistake?

Thanks for your carefully review and good suggestions. The chemical composition of SA738Gr.B steel has been added in Section 2.1. We sorry that we made a mistake on the material description. The base material used in this paper is SA738Gr. B steel rather than 316L steel. The chemical compositions of SA738Gr.B steel are listed in Table 1. The filler material is E9018-G-H4, which chemical compositions is also listed in Table 1.

Table 1. Main chemical component of SA738Gr.B steel and E9018-G-H4 (wt.%)

Material

Fe

Al

Cr

Cu

Mn

Mo

Nb

Ni

Si

V

C

P

S

Base

97.143

0.028

0.18

0.02

1.44

0.2

0.51

0.3

0.3

0.04

0.11

0.0070

0.0020

Filler

Bal.

-

≤0.20

≤0.05

0.6~1.95

≤0.50

-

0.8~1.8

≤0.80

≤0.05

≤0.12

≤0.03

≤0.03

Further, in Figure 6 and Table 3, the stress-strain curves and the results of determining the mechanical properties for steel SA738Gr.B are presented. If so, is there an error in determining the strains on the curves? Is it hard to believe that pearlite steel has an elongation to rupture of 70% at 20°C. What specimen geometry was used in these tests? How was Young's modulus determined at such high temperatures? This is important because, as far as it follows from the paper, the data on the temperature dependences of stresses and strains were put into the model, and then the values of the resulting stresses and strains of the product after heat treatment were calculated from these data.

Thanks for your carefully review. It is true that the mechanical properties for steel SA738Gr.B is the key parameters for the residual stresses simulation. The stress-strain curves of SA738Gr.B steel at different temperatures have been revised, as shown in Fig. 6. The round bar specimen was used. Young's modulus is determined by the slope at elastic stage.

Figure 6. Stress-strain curve of SA738Gr.B steel at different temperatures.

2. Are there data on model verification for at least one case under study?

Thanks for your carefully review. In Section 3.1, in order to verify the simulation accuracy, the hoop and axials stresses before and after local PWHT were also measured by impact indentation method [19], as shown in Fig. 8(a). It can be seen that the residual stresses distribution by simulation have a good agreement with the experiment, verifying the simulation method is right.

Fig. 8 (a) Distribution of residual stress for thickness ratio 2 before and after local PWHT along Path-1 by simulation and experiment

Other notes and recommendations:

3. There is a formula in the Abstract. If the authors want to provide the formula in the Abstract, then they should also give a decoding of the parameters HB, k, R and T.

Thanks for your comments. The decoding of the parameters HB, k, R and T has been defined in the abstract.

4. Lines 120-122 represent heating and cooling data. From what considerations were such heating and cooling rates chosen in the indicated temperature ranges?

Thanks for your carefully review and good suggestions again. Cooling and heating rates are based on ASME code. ASME stipulates that the maximum heating rate and cooling rate can be calculated ac-cording to the material thickness of the welded joint, above 425 °C and can not exceed 222 °C or less than 56 °C at any interval of hours [17]. Heated and cooled at different rates before and after 425 ℃. The heating rates before and after 425℃ are 150℃/h and 56℃/h, respectively. The inadequacy of this content in Article 2.3 has been modified.

5. Figure 3 shows “main” and “auxiliary” heatings. Are these two different heat treatments? Why is there only one curve in the figure?

Thank you for your question. This is a writing typo. There is only one main heating in the figure. “The temperature cycle curve of main and auxiliar heating.” has been revised as “The temperature cycle curve of heating.”

6. What temperature dependence of Poisson's ratio is used in the model? How does it change when heated?

The temperature dependence of Poisson's ratio is used in the simulation, which are shown in Table 4.

7. In equation (5), the parameter εth is not deciphered.

Thanks for your comments. A descriptions of the variable  and  stand for creep strain and thermal strain have been added.

8. Misprints are seen in line 75 (I instead of II), line 109 (ff duplicated twice), line 154 (h-1), line 178 (radical).

Thank you for your comments. We have modified these mistakes in the article.

9. In Figure 7 and following, there is no interpretation of the S22, S33, etc. designations.

Thanks for your carefully review again. In Section 3.1, we add an explanation for the terms Mises, S11, S22 and S33. In the figure, Mises is Mises stress; S11 is radial stress; S22 is axial stress, and S33 is circumferential stress.

10. Conclusion #4 in the “Conclusions” The formula proposed by the authors involves only the geometric parameters of the structure (wall thickness, radius, ...), and does not involve the thermal characteristics of the material. Obviously, the formula is not universal, and is applicable only to one steel grade or group of steels. It is necessary to mention this in the Conclusions and Abstract.

Thank you for pointing this out. In the summary and conclusion, we have pointed out that the formula proposed in this paper is only applicable to SA738Gr.B steel to prevent unnecessary confusion and make the article more rigorous.

Thanks for your time and efforts on our paper. We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript. We hope you find these revisions acceptable. Thanks very much again.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Manuscript titled "A uniformed calculation criterion on heat band width of local PWHT on welded joint with dissimilar thickness" is a nice analytical oriented work on ABAQUS for PWHT of welding of dissimilar thickness materials. 

Recommendation: Review Again After Resubmission (Paper is not acceptable in its current form, but has merit. A major rewrite is required. Author should be encouraged to resubmit a rewritten version after the changes suggested in the Comments section have been completed.)

Before publishing, the authors must revise the paper as per comments mentioned below:

1. Copyright permissions for figures taken from published papers should be checked. Plagiarism must be below the limit prescribed by the journal. This is just a general reminder comment only. Reviewer has not checked the plagiarism or copyrights.

2. Extensive editing of English language required. English grammar to be thoroughly checked and corrections to be made especially in Abstract and Conclusion sections. Many typos noticed such as: “Before define the heat-band width……..”

“The interior diameter of 43 m….”

3. Mention research gaps, Objectives and Novelty of the research work in last paragraph of Introduction section. Please mention that the secondary heat bands have already been investigated by other researchers as well.

4. Introduction section should be enriched by adding some more discussion on welding such as

Effect of tool pin profile on performance of friction stir welding of brass-copper-based butt welded joint

Numerical and experimental investigation on distribution of residual stress and the influence of heat treatment in multi-pass dissimilar welded rotor joint of alloy 617/10Cr steel

5. Fig. 5: Is percent elongation to failure same for all temperature conditions? How is that possible?

6. Fig 8: Explain in more detail the reasons behind the curves not being symmetrical?

7. Section 3.4: Mention details about the Optimization Method utilized and the number of iterations performed along with computational time requirements. Are the optimal values (auxiliary HB width 1750 mm, 1500 mm, 1250 mm for k=2.5, 2, 1.5 respectively) mentioned here just the local minima or global?

8. The author should explain the difference between Path-1, 2, and 3.

9. The authors have clearly illustrated the walls and weld region in a couple of figures but forgone them for others, uniformity should be maintained.

10. Figures 8 and 13 need further elaboration.

11. The author should comprehensively explain the radial deformation after the post-weld heat treatment technique and its effect on structural integrity. 

12. The authors are advised to implement a quantitative analysis of the results in the conclusion section.

13. The figure consisting of parts a and b should be horizontally placed instead of vertically for better comparative analysis.

 

 

Extensive editing of English language required. English grammar to be thoroughly checked and corrections to be made especially in Abstract and Conclusion sections. Many typos noticed such as: “Before define the heat-band width……..”

“The interior diameter of 43 m….”

 

Author Response

Dear reviewer 2,

Thanks very much for very good constructive criticism and comments on our paper. We have modified the manuscript accordingly, and the detailed comments are responded as follows:

Comments from reviewer 2:

1. Copyright permissions for figures taken from published papers should be checked. Plagiarism must be below the limit prescribed by the journal. This is just a general reminder comment only. Reviewer has not checked the plagiarism or copyrights.

Thanks for your comments. Our data is really valid. Data obtained from published papers are copyrighted. And the article did not plagiarize.

2. Extensive editing of English language required. English grammar to be thoroughly checked and corrections to be made especially in Abstract and Conclusion sections. Many typos noticed such as: “Before define the heat-band width……..”

“The interior diameter of 43 m….”

Thank you for your comments.

The sentence “Before define the heat-band width…….” has been modified as “Before defining the heat-band width…….”

The sentence “The interior diameter of 43 m….” has been modified as “The interior diameter is 43 m….”

“Finally, a calculation formula of local heat treatment heating width based on the thickness of welded joint is proposed.”has been modified to “Finally, a calculation formula of local heat treatment heating width based on the thickness of the welded joint is proposed.”

“The thickness of thinner wall of all models are 52 mm.” has been modified to “The thickness of thinner wall of all models is 52 mm.”

We have checked the whole article, and other errors have been corrected.

3. Mention research gaps, Objectives and Novelty of the research work in last paragraph of Introduction section. Please mention that the secondary heat bands have already been investigated by other researchers as well.

Thank you for pointing this out. The secondary heat band appears in the second paragraph of the introduction. “Dong et al. [10] proposed an alternative approach for achieving an effective control of thermal stresses caused by local PWHT by introducing a secondary heat band (SHB).” The article is also expressed that some scholars have studied the secondary heat bands. Jin et al. [11] proposed a new local post-weld heat treatment technology based on primary and secondary heating(PS-PWHT).It can significantly reduce the residual stress caused by welding, and even produce a certain degree of compressive residual stress in the welding area of the container.

The regulations on the width of the heating zone in the local post-weld heat treatment standards of various countries cannot be unified, and there is no reference standard for the width of the heating zone in the local post-weld heat treatment of unequal thickness joints. It is important to establish a uniformed calculation criterion on heat band width of local PWHT on welded joint with dissimilar thickness.

4. Introduction section should be enriched by adding some more discussion on welding such as, Effect of tool pin profile on performance of friction stir welding of brass-copper-based butt welded joint; Numerical and experimental investigation on distribution of residual stress and the influence of heat treatment in multi-pass dissimilar welded rotor joint of alloy 617/10Cr steel.

Thanks for your good suggestions again. We have added some welding content to improve the article.

5. Fig. 5: Is percent elongation to failure same for all temperature conditions? How is that possible?

Thanks you for your question. The stress-strain curve of SA738Gr.B steel at different temperatures were shown in Figure 6.

6. Fig 8: Explain in more detail the reasons behind the curves not being symmetrical?

Thank you for your question.The local heat treatment of unequal thickness plate will cause asymmetric temperature field distribution due to the asymmetry of the structure, which will affect the residual stress field. This section has been added to the article. On the other hand, the weld surface is multi-pass welding, and the front and rear welding affects the symmetrical distribution of welding residual stress on the surface.

7. Section 3.4: Mention details about the Optimization Method utilized and the number of iterations performed along with computational time requirements. Are the optimal values (auxiliary HB width 1750 mm, 1500 mm, 1250 mm for k=2.5, 2, 1.5 respectively) mentioned here just the local minima or global?

Thanks for pointing this out. The optimal values mentioned here are global minima. As the width of the auxiliary heating band increases, the axial stress and the circumferential stress finally tend to be stable. It can be considered that the article studies the minimum global value. We have added a description of the trend of the curve in article 3.4.

8. The author should explain the difference between Path-1, 2, and 3.

Thanks for your carefully review again. We have explained the difference between Path-1, 2, and 3 in 2.2. Path-1, Path-2 and Path-3 are the paths from top to bottom along the inner and outer sur-faces of the cylinder and from the inner surface to the outer surface along the weld center line, respectively.

9. The authors have clearly illustrated the walls and weld region in a couple of figures but forgone them for others, uniformity should be maintained.

Thanks for your good comments. We have supplemented the walls and weld region in the article. The modified figures are as follows.

Figure 8. Distribution of residual stress for thickness ratio 2 before and after local PWHT along (a) Path-1, (b) Path-2 and (c) Path-3.

Figure 13. Distribution of residual stress before and after PWHT with new defined HB width along (a) Path-1, (b) Path-2 and (c) Path-3.

10. Figures 8 and 13 need further elaboration.

Thank you for your comments again. We have added further elaboration to Figures 8 and 13 in the article.

It can be seen from Figure 8(a) and Figure 8(b) that the distribution of residual stress components on the inner and outer surfaces is very similar: the circumferential stress S33 obtains the maximum tensile stress at the weld toe of the thin plate, which is 634 MPa and 620 MPa, respectively. The tensile stress on the surface of each end welding is reduced, and the minimum tensile stress of the weld is 484 MPa and 493 MPa respectively. The maximum axial stress S22 of the inner and outer surfaces also occurs at the weld toe of the thin plate, which is 536 MPa and 525 MPa tensile stress, respectively. The stress value on the surface of the respective final welding is greatly reduced, and the center of the final welding surface is transformed into a compressive stress of about -50 MPa. In general, the distribution of welding residual stress on the inner and outer surfaces of unequal thickness joints is similar, and the stress values are slightly different, but the difference is not significant. It can be seen from Figure 8(c) that the axial and circumferential stress trends along the weld center line are similar, and the minimum stress values appear in the middle of the plate thickness, which are -539 MPa and 33 MPa, respectively. The circumferential stress is tensile stress along the whole path, and the axial stress is compressive stress in the range of 1/3 wall thickness from the inner surface to 1/6 wall thickness from the outer surface. The maximum compressive stress is -539 MPa. The radial stress along the weld centerline fluctuates around zero.

 It can be seen from Figure 13 (a) and Figure 13 (b) that the distribution of welding re-sidual stress of unequal thickness joints on the inner and outer surfaces is similar, and the numerical difference is not large, but after heat treatment, there will be a big dif-ference: the axial stress S22 and the circumferential stress S33 are higher than the out-er surface stress as a whole. This is because the inner surface of the cylinder and the reinforcing plate is more obviously squeezed during the recovery process. Figure 13 (a) shows that the axial stress of the thin plate side is higher than that of the thick plate side after local heat treatment. Compared with the high level of welding residual cir-cumferential stress, the circumferential residual distribution of the inner surface after heat treatment is greatly reduced, which changes in the range of −19~178 MPa. Figure 13 (b) shows that the axial and circumferential stresses are significantly reduced along the outer surface path 2 after heat treatment, and the circumferential stress S33 on the side of the thin plate is transformed into a compressive stress of up to-200 MPa. The axial and circumferential stress distribution of the weld surface is similar, which is re-duced on the surface of the final weld, and the maximum value is about 200 MPa. Fig-ure 13 (c) shows the distribution of axial and circumferential stress along the weld centerline. Overall, the stress distribution along the weld centerline is more uniform after heat treatment.

11. The author should comprehensively explain the radial deformation after the post-weld heat treatment technique and its effect on structural integrity.

Thanks for pointing this out. In Section 3.3, we add the radial deformation after PWHT and its effect on structural integrity. With the heating process of heat treatment, the maximum radial displacement position of the local heat treatment model of unequal thickness plate after welding is trans-ferred from the welding joint to the heating zone of the thin plate base metal, and the radial displacement of the model reaches the maximum at the end of heat preservation.

12. The authors are advised to implement a quantitative analysis of the results in the conclusion section.

Thanks for your carefully review and good suggestions. We have quantitatively analyzed the results in the conclusion part. The maximum axial and circumferential residual stresses are 536 MPa and 793 MPa, respectively, which are located in the weld toes on the outer and inner surfaces. By comparing the local heat treatment results under the width of the auxiliary heating zone, it is suggested that the width of the auxiliary heating zone of the post weld heat treatment of the joint with a thickness ratio of 2 is 1500 mm. After heat treatment at the recommended auxiliary heating width, the circumferential stress is reduced by 60 % compared with the as-welded state. The radial and axial reductions were 25.2 % and 3.7 %, respectively. The radial deformation around welded joint dur-ing holding stage is almost the same. Therefore, the additional bending stress in weld toe induced by inconsistent deformation is eliminated, enhancing the ability to SCC of weld joint.

13. The figure consisting of parts a and b should be horizontally placed instead of vertically for better comparative analysis.

Thank you for pointing this out. We have placed the graphs composed of parts a and b horizontally for better comparative analysis.

Thanks for your time and efforts on our paper. We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript. We hope you find these revisions acceptable. Thanks very much again.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Review of revised version of the article "A uniformed calculation criterion on heat band width of local PWHT on welded joint with dissimilar thickness" by Y. Zhang, J. Xie and Y. Luo.

The authors managed to correct most of the comments given during the review. However, there are still a few issues that need clarification and corrections:

1. In the new version of the manuscripts Figure 6 comes after Figure 3. Figures 4 and 5 are missing.

2. The stress-strain curves shown in Figure 6 have been corrected as claimed by the authors. However, these curves still raise questions.

Thus, according to the obtained data, the relative elongation to rupture decreases monotonically with increasing temperature. Although for steels like the one studied in the paper, ductility usually increases, at least in certain temperature ranges. I ask you to check the stress-strain curves once again.

I will also note one more detail. In response to comments, the authors mentioned that they measured the Young's modulus from the slope of the elastic stage of the curves. Obviously, for this it was necessary to use a strain gauge (tensometer/extension gauge) to accurately determine the strain. Were the curves indicated in fig. 6 recorded with strain gauge? If so, at what point was it removed from the specimen during testing?

I consider this issue to be important and requiring clarity in the description of the testing methodology and the presentation of strain curves.

3. The numbering of the beads in the weld in Figure 1a is very small. I think it should be removed. Models 1, 2 and 3 should preferably be done on the same scale.

Author Response

Dear reviewer 1,

Thanks very much for very good constructive criticism and comments on our paper. We have modified the manuscript accordingly, and the detailed comments are responded as follows:

Comments from reviewer 1:

1. In the new version of the manuscripts Figure 6 comes after Figure 3. Figures 4 and 5 are missing.

Thanks for your carefully review and good suggestions. We have corrected the order number of the graphs in the article.

2. The stress-strain curves shown in Figure 6 have been corrected as claimed by the authors. However, these curves still raise questions.

Thus, according to the obtained data, the relative elongation to rupture decreases monotonically with increasing temperature. Although for steels like the one studied in the paper, ductility usually increases, at least in certain temperature ranges. I ask you to check the stress-strain curves once again.

I will also note one more detail. In response to comments, the authors mentioned that they measured the Young's modulus from the slope of the elastic stage of the curves. Obviously, for this it was necessary to use a strain gauge (tensometer/extension gauge) to accurately determine the strain. Were the curves indicated in fig. 6 recorded with strain gauge? If so, at what point was it removed from the specimen during testing?

I consider this issue to be important and requiring clarity in the description of the testing methodology and the presentation of strain curves.

Thanks for your carefully review and good comments. We have checked the stress-strain curves and modified it. We added Figure 4 to show the tensile specimens and experimental devices at different temperatures. Seen from Figure 4 and 5, the fracture elongation increases monotonically with increasing temperature. The extensometer is used to record the deformation of tensile specimen, and the load sensors is used to record the load on tensile specimen. The extensometer was not removed throughout the tensile test. Relevant revised descriptions have been added to the article.

     Figure 4. MTS Landmark 370.10 testing solution and tensile specimens.

Figure 5. Stress-strain curve of SA738Gr.B steel at different temperatures.

3. The numbering of the beads in the weld in Figure 1a is very small. I think it should be removed. Models 1, 2 and 3 should preferably be done on the same scale.

Thank you for pointing this out. 3. The numbering of the beads have been deleted in Figure 1a. The geometric models have been modified on the same scale, as shown in Figure 1. The modified figure is as follows.

Figure 1. Geometric model and dimensional details of model I (a), II (b) and III (c).

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Following are the comments for revised paper:

1.       Some of the previous comments have not been addressed properly

(i)                  How can Interior diameter be 43 m. Even after pointing out this error specifically to the authors, the same has not been corrected while revising the paper.

(ii)             Fig. 5: Is percent elongation to failure same for all temperature conditions? How is that possible?

(iii)               Fig. 5 is missing in Revised Paper

(iv)               Fig. 4 is also missing in Revised Paper

(v)                 Section 3.4: Mention details about the Optimization Method utilized and the number of iterations performed along with computational time requirements.

(vi)               English usage needs improvement. Please revise thoroughly

English usage needs improvement. Please revise thoroughly

 

Author Response

Dear reviewer 2,

Thanks very much for very good constructive criticism and comments on our paper. We have modified the manuscript accordingly, and the detailed comments are responded as follows:

Comments from reviewer 2:

 (i)How can Interior diameter be 43 m. Even after pointing out this error specifically to the authors, the same has not been corrected while revising the paper.

Thank you for pointing this out. SA738Gr.B steel meets the requirements of nuclear power containment steel. The welded joint with dissimilar wall thickness in this paper is based on the background of nuclear power containment. Here, the inner diameter of steel containment vessel of nuclear power plant is 43 m. The article has also increased the interpretation of the interior diameter. The two dimensional axisymmetric finite element models were built.

(ii) Fig. 5: Is percent elongation to failure same for all temperature conditions? How is that possible?

Thanks for your carefully review and good suggestions. It is verified that the elongation of the material increases with the increase of temperature. So we deleted the original Figure 5 and modified it in Figure 4 (the original Figure 6).

(iii) Fig. 5 is missing in Revised Paper

Thanks for your carefully review. The original Figure 5 is repetitive figure and we delete it in the revised manuscript.

(iv) Fig. 4 is also missing in Revised Paper

Thank you for your carefully review. After checking, we found that Table 3 contains the information to be expressed in Figure 4. So we deleted Figure 4. The chart number errors in the article have been modified.

(v) Section 3.4: Mention details about the Optimization Method utilized and the number of iterations performed along with computational time requirements.

In Section 3.4, the heating band width optimization method for the welded joint with thickness ratio k=1.5 and k=2.5 is the same as the k=2 joint mentioned above.

The residual stress and deformation was compared for different heat band widths. In this study, the heat band width is optimized based on the small changed residual stress. We determine the optimal auxiliary heating width by analyzing the variation trend of maximum residual stress, maximum residual deformation, maximum stress at the end of heat preservation and maximum radial displacement with the auxiliary heating width. The minimum value of the heating width that makes these four quantities basically stable is obtained. Through comparative analysis, the most suitable heating width value is selected.

(vi) English usage needs improvement. Please revise thoroughly

Thanks for your comments. The English grammars have been checked in detail. We hope this revision are acceptable.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf