Contribution of specific work of fracture to size effect in microcutting

Abstract

ABSTRACTSpecific work of fracture (R) has been widely used to quantify the energy consumed in formation of new surfaces during metal cutting. R becomes a significant portion of total cutting energy in microcutting, thereby influencing the phenomenon of “size effect. ” Therefore, this work presents an evaluation of specific work of fracture for sharp and rounded-edged tools, knowing cutting forces and shear angles from LS-DYNA simulations of orthogonal microcutting of low-carbon AISI 1215 steel. The R was also evaluated as a function of process parameters such as cutting speed, rake angle, tool edge radius, and uncut chip thickness, so as to illustrate the effect of these variables on the magnitude of R and contribution of R to the specific cutting energy or “size effect.” It is observed that R increases with an increase in uncut chip thickness, whereas it decreases with an increase in cutting speed, rake angle, and tool edge radius. UR defines the contribution of fracture to the specific cutting energy (U) due to specific work of fracture R. At all the parametric conditions, the contribution of fracture is higher at lower uncut chip thickness and it is of 8–36% in microcutting of AISI 1215 steel.