Machining of holes on SS316L with solid and hollow tool electrodes

ABSTRACT

The article explains the electrochemical machining of holes on a 350 μm thick biomaterial SS316 L plate with the hollow and solid tool electrodes of 250 μm diameter using the in-house developed experimental setup. The electrolyte used for the experimental study is sodium bromide. The machining process parameters are the concentration of the electrolyte (wt % C), voltage (V), and duty factor (% DF). The top diameter (D), bottom diameter (d), circularity error (C), material removal rate (MRR), taper angle (TA), stray corrosion zone width (SCZ), and radial overcut (ROC) of the hole machined are evaluated. The solid tool electrode produced holes with a higher MRR of 30.11 µg/s, less circularity error of 71.35 µm, lower ROC of 239.80 µm compared to the hollow tool electrode, which has MRR of 17.48 µg/s, circularity error of 102.95 µm, and ROC of 365.63 µm. On the other hand, the hollow tool electrode produced lower SCZ width of 392.36 µm in comparison with the solid tool SCZ width of 778.73 µm. The lower TA angle of 0.23 is obtained by both the tool electrodes. The generated hole images are acquired using the high-resolution scanning electron microscope (HRSEM) and analyzed by the surface topography. The energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) is also used to identify the changes in the material composition after the electrochemical machining process, and the presence of sodium and bromine is found on the machined hole surface.

KEYWORDS:

• µ-ECM
• biomaterial
• SS316L
• IEG
• solid
• tool
• electrode
• hollow
• hole
• topography
• MRR
• SCZwidth
• circularity
• ROC
• TA

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).