Study of cutting force and surface roughness in Ball nose end milling of vacuum hot pressed A356 alloy/SiCp metal matrix composite

Abstract

The ball nose end milling is widely used to produce complex sculptured surfaces. However, variation of surface roughness and cutting forces in the process is not well understood due to continuous change in tool-workpiece engagement. Aluminum based metal matrix composites (MMCs) are upcoming materials which are used in many industries in different shapes from different machining processes. Therefore, this paper explore the effect of machining parameters on machinability of the A356 alloy-SiC particles (10 vol%) reinforced MMC in ball nose milling process.Raw materials were taken in powder form and average size of A356 alloy powders were 50 µm in size and SiC particles (SiCp) were in 1 µm. Composite was synthesized through vacuum hot pressing at 600 °C with 25 MPa pressure. Ball end mill machining experiments were carried out as per Taguchi L9 array. From the experimental results, surface roughness (Ra) values were varied from 0.564 to 2.804 µm and cutting force (Resultant-FR) values were varied from 9.24 to 56.48 N. From results, it is observed that, Ra and FR values were decreased with increase in cutting speed and increased with increase of feed and depth cut.