Investigating machining characteristics and degradation rate of biodegradable ZM21 magnesium alloy in end milling process

Abstract

Surface properties play a significant role in the biocompatibility and biodegradation of Mg-alloy implants which primarily depends on the manufacturing route followed. In the present work, the milling process has been optimized on ZM21 Mg-alloy to obtain the trade-off between the material removal rate (MRR), surface roughness (SR), and degradation rate (DR). Milling parameters vary the amount of force and pressure developed between the tool and work interface, thus, affecting the MRR and SR. The weight loss of machined samples was measured after seven days of immersion in simulated body fluid (SBF) to calculate the DR. L16 orthogonal array was used to study the effect of milling parameters such as tool rotation speed (TRS), feed rate (FR), and depth of cut (DoC). The result showed that the variation in the values of milling parameters significantly influences the surface integrity of Mg-alloy, thus affecting the DR. Chip morphology and surface cracks with scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were evaluated to correlate the influence of milling parameters on the machining performance of ZM21 Mg-alloy. The machined surface of Mg-alloy must be of very low SR and cracks-free to avoid fast corrosion. Therefore, grey relational analysis (GRA) has been employed for multi-optimization to get the best trade-off for higher MRR and lower SR and DR. The optimized setting suggested by GRA for milling of ZM21 Mg alloy is TRS: 2700 rpm, FR: 25 mm/min, and DoC: 1.25 mm.