Wire electrical discharge machining (EDM) setup parameters influence in functional surface roughness

Abstract

Electrical discharge machining (EDM) is an important manufacturing process with broad use in hard-to-machine alloys and to achieve complex geometries. The ordinary attention in setup has been focused on the classical one-dimensional Ra frequently specified in mechanical parts. The EDM process has 2D patterns (wire) or 3D (electrode) and many functional requirements of engineering surfaces are evaluated through functional roughness parameters that have a scarce treatment in literature on EDM setup. This paper presents a systematic search study of the influence of setup parameters of wire EDM for two quite different metal alloys: aluminum A6082 and high speed steel (HSS) AISI M42. The experimental methodology includes the analysis by design of experiments under Taguchi approach, correlation, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and multivariate regression. The results show the complexity of the surface topography, its partial description based on standardized roughness parameters and the quantification of the EDM main control factor influences.