Role of stabilizers on agglomeration of debris during micro-electrical discharge machining

Abstract

Micro-electrical discharge machining (µ-EDM) as an advanced mechanical micro-machining method has been widely used in the generation of micro-features by removing debris through melting and evaporation phenomena, and during this time some amount of debris is dispersed in the dielectric medium. These debris are treated as unwanted materials and later will be disposed of from the system. But, after critical evaluation of the debris through transmission electron microscope (TEM), it is found that the debris are agglomerated and in the size range of 40–600 nm (mean size: 242 nm). This makes curious to search for any alternatives to overcome the agglomeration to result into ultrafine particles in the range of nanometres. In the present article, an attempt has been made to incorporate ultrasonication during machining process and also resorted to use stabilizers. As per chemistry aspect of metallic aluminium particles, Poly Ethylene Glycol (PEG), Bael Gum (BG) and ACacia Gum (ACG) stabilizers are used along with deionized (DI) water and studied their effect individually on the interaction between the nucleated nanoparticles. The characterization results reveal that using PEG, BG and ACG, the debris of aluminium generated are in the size range of 45–500 nm (mean size: 196 nm), 25–70 nm (mean size: 45 nm) and 3–30 nm (mean size: 10 nm), respectively. ACG stabilizer was found to be strongly reduce the agglomeration resulting in excellent stable dispersion of the colloidal aluminium nanoparticles. The nature of colloidal samples was studied by ultraviolet–visible (UV–vis) spectroscopy after 2 weeks of their generation. Furthermore, thermal conductivity and viscosity properties are ascertained, and the heat transfer effect has also been studied experimentally using a developed thermal management system. The obtained results are presented in the article.