The influence of grinding conditions on surface roughness parameters of 20MnCr5 steel vacuum-carburised by single-piece flow method

Abstract

The purpose of the experimental tests described in the article was to determine the effect of selected abrasive machining conditions on the value of surface roughness of 20MnCr5 steel samples. The samples were subjected to vacuum carburising (LPC) using the ‘single-piece flow’ method and high-pressure gas quenching (HPGQ) in a 4D Quenching chamber to obtain an effective case depth (ECD) of 0.4 mm. Next, the samples were ground with a Norton Vortex corundum grinding wheel. Cooling and lubricating fluid was delivered to the grinding zone using the flooding method (WET) and with the minimum quantity lubrication method (MQL). The samples were ground in one pass of the grinding wheel using two grinding depths – ae = 0.01 mm and ae = 0.02 mm. For each grinding test, surface roughness measurements were made using a stationary laboratory profilometer T8000 from Hommel Werke. These measurements enabled the determination of the 2D and 3D roughness parameters. Analysis of the measurement results showed that for the adopted test conditions, the use of the MQL method resulted in a decrease in surface roughness compared to the surface ground using the WET method. This property applies to both tested grinding depths.