https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7804-5140
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ABSTRACT
Due to its high melting point, tungsten carbide is perfect for mold-core usage during glass molding processes (GMP) such as those needed for manufacturing aspheric lenses. However, its extreme hardness makes it exceedingly difficult to machine. To overcome this problem, a BDD (boron-doped diamond) end-grinding-milling tool with dual-negative rake angle is designed and applied in this study to effectively mill a tungsten-carbide substrate. The first negative rake angle, with cutting edge across the tool’s centerline, prevents squashing during cutting between tool point and mold-core surface. This suppresses brittle fracturing by cutting material under pressure-cutting force in the machining area. Further, when preparing the cutting tool, micro w-EDM was used to create micro-protrusion abrasives on the plane of the first negative rake angle that feature a different second negative rake angle, providing pressure in all directions during material removal. This feature ensured cutting occurred under a non-tensile-stress regime, which avoided microcracks and subsurface damage. Experiments have shown that the developed end-grinding-milling tool was successful in creating micro-flutes and an aspheric lens mold-core array. Surface roughness was nano-scale and there were no burrs nor chipping along mold edges, indicating the designed BDD end-grinding-milling tool is good for grinding-milling of superhard materials.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank the National Science Technology Council of the Republic of China, Taiwan, for financially supporting this study under Contract No. MSTC 112-2218-E-003-001.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).