Magnetic Field Assisted Finishing of Ceramics—Part III: On the Thermal Aspects of Magnetic Abrasive Finishing (MAF) of Ceramic Rollers

Abstract

Conditions during finishing of advanced ceramics by magnetic abrasive finishing (MAF) processes are found to be, by and large, transient. Consequently, the available quasi-steady-state solutions for the moving heat sources are not directly applicable for this case. Hence, the general solution for a moving disk heat source, developed in Part I of this three-part series, is applied to determine the minimum flash temperatures and flash times generated at the contact points between the workmaterial (Si3N4 roller) and the abrasive (Cr2O3)). Since chemo-mechanical action between the abrasive—the workmaterial—the environment depends on both the thermodynamics and kinetics of the process, it is important to determine the flash temperatures as well as flash times during polishing. These were determined as a function of the polishing pressure and the rotational speed of the work material in this investigation. Thermodynamic considerations (not covered in this paper) indicate that even the minimum flash temperatures generated under the conditions of lower pressure, lower sliding velocity, and transient state would be adequate to initiate chemo-mechanical action, and experimental results confirmed the formation of chemo-mechanical reaction products during polishing (Bhagavatula and Komanduri, 1996).