Influence of machining parameters on surface roughness in AL6063-W composite by wire EDM process: Experimental investigations and process optimization

Abstract

Surface roughness in a machining process plays a vital role in the dimensional accuracy of the machine part. In view of this, in the present work experimental investigations were performed on a novel AL6063-W alloy by a commercial wire electric discharge machine in order to study the influence of machining parameters on the surface roughness of the material. Pulse on time (Ton), servo voltage (Sv), and pulse off time (Toff) were chosen as the machining parameters. Stir casting method was used for the development of the composite. In order to predict the surface roughness the model was developed using the response surface methodology (RSM) technique. Central composite design (CCD) was used to design a 20 set experiments, and the developed model was validated using the random set of parameters. The statistical model was developed using the analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique at a confidence interval of 95% i.e. p=0.05. It was obtained that among the chosen factors, TonandToff played the significant influence on the surface roughness of the composite. Further, genetic algorithm tool box using MATLAB was used to determine the optimum parameters for minimum surface roughness.