Abstract
Electrochemical machining (ECM) is a non-traditional machining technology that is widely used in the manufacturing of key components in the aviation industry. The current efficiency is defined as the ratio of the observed amount of dissolved metal to the theoretical amount predicted from Faraday’s law. In ECM, the current efficiency curve relates the dissolution rate of the anode material and the current density. Accurate measurement of the current efficiency curve is the basis for anode shape prediction and cathode tool design. However, in conventional measurement methods, the phenomenon of edge stray corrosion introduces significant measurement errors. Improving the current efficiency is thus a challenging task for any electrophysical or electrochemical machining process. To improve the measurement accuracy, this paper proposes a current efficiency curve measurement with a casing-type anode. In the proposed measurement method, the anode is designed in two parts: the mandril and the casing. The edge stray corrosion effect is mainly concentrated on the casing, and only the current distribution on the mandril is considered in the calculation of current efficiency. The measurement simulations of the conventional and the proposed methods were carried out. The simulation results show that the casing-type method significantly improves the accuracy of current efficiency measurements, and the current efficiency curve of 304SS was obtained.
Highlights
Electrochemical machining (ECM) is a non-traditional machining technology whereby material removal is accomplished through the controlled anodic dissolution of the workpiece
This study proposed a highly accurate current efficiency curve measurement technique with a casing-type anode
The specimen being measured was designed into two parts: the mandril and the casing
Summary
Electrochemical machining (ECM) is a non-traditional machining technology whereby material removal is accomplished through the controlled anodic dissolution of the workpiece. One of these methods is the constant current method In this measurement technique, the target alloy material is dissolved into electrolyte under a constant current by adjusting the processing voltage; it is without any tool feed action. The current efficiency of the target material can be calculated on the basis of the assumption of uniform current distribution on the anode surface [15,16,17] This method is easy to implement; as the ECM process usually adopts a constant voltage machining mode, the cathode tool gets continuously fed during the processing. The target alloy material is dissolved in the electrolyte under the constant current, which is obtained by adjusting the cathode tool feed rate This helps the ECM processing to reach the equilibrium state. Several numerical simulations and experiments have been performed to investigate the measurement accuracy and stability of the current efficiency curve obtained by the proposed measurement method
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