Investigation and modelling of process parameters and workpiece dimensions influence on material removal rate in CWEDT process

Abstract

Cylindrical wire electrical discharge turning (CWEDT) is a special form of wire electrical discharge machining (WEDM) process, which uses submerged rotation spindle as a clamping device for workpiece rotation in order to produce cylindrical parts. This study aims at determining influence on material removal rate (MRR) of CWEDT as an objective function. In the preliminary experiments, the widely used X5CrNi18–10 (DIN) and hard machinable S390PM (DIN) were used. The results of preliminary experiments showed that the type of steel is not the factor that has a significant influence on MRR. Pulse maximum current, pulse pause time, rotation speed, length of discharge area and cutting radius were used in MRR mathematical modelling by neural network programming. The results of the study exhibit that among the machining parameters, the pulse maximum current has the strongest influence on MRR. When the pulse maximum current increases, MRR increases as well. The discharge area length has an influence on MRR only on higher pulse maximum current values, and by the increase of the discharge area length, the MRR also increases. The derived mathematical model for MRR, which was finally validated and tested, enables calculation of complex cylindrical part production machining time for the given experimental set-up condition.

Keywords:

• cylindrical wire electrical discharge turning (CWEDT)
• material removal rate (MRR)
• cylindrical parts
• hard machinable material
• neural networks

Additional information

Funding

This research work was supported by Ministry of Science, Education and Sport of the Republic of Croatia and by Laboratory for Machine Tools and Production Engineering (WZL) of RWTH Aachen University. The authors are grateful to Chief Engineer Dipl. Ing. Drazen Veselovac, Department of Monitoring and EDM/ECM, for support in the experimentation part of this research.