Machinability Performance of RBD Palm Oil as a Bio Degradable Dielectric Fluid on Sustainable Electrical Discharge Machining (EDM) of AISI D2 Steel

Abstract

Dielectric fluid plays a very significant role in any electrical discharge machining (EDM) operation. Hence, a proper selection of dielectric medium is an important consideration for EDM performance. This study is to investigate the usability and performance of bio degradable oil based dielectric fluid in comparison with conventional dielectric fluid when EDM machining of AISI D2 steel by using copper as a tool electrode. Peak current, Ip up to 12 A and pulse on-time, ton up to 150 μs were selected as the main parameters. Refined, Bleached and Deodorised (RBD) Palm oil (cooking oil) and kerosene were used as dielectric fluid. Their influence on the machinability such as material removal rate (MRR), electrode wear rate (EWR), and surface roughness (Ra) were experimentally investigated. The result shows that omit the highest Ip= 12 A and the lowest ton= 150 μs yields the highest MRR for both palm oil and kerosene dielectric fluid, respectively. The improvement of MRR for palm oil as dielectric fluid is about 158.56% when compared to kerosene at the same parameter setting. Meanwhile, machining by using palm oil and kerosene at Ip = 6 A and ton = 150 µs yields the lowest EWR and Ra respectively. However, the value of EWR and Ra for palm oil is slightly higher compared to kerosene. In the case of machinability, bio-dielectric fluid which is palm oil shows a significant potential for its performance in EDM machining of AISI D2 steel.