Experimental Study of Drilling Temperature, Geometrical Errors and Thermal Expansion of Drill on Hole Accuracy When Drilling CFRP/Ti Alloy Stacks

Application of ANN for Analysis of Hole Accuracy and Drilling Temperature When Drilling CFRP/Ti Alloy Stacks

Drilling of Carbon Fiber-Reinforced Plastic/Titanium alloy (CFRP/Ti) stacks represents one of the most widely used machining methods for making holes to fasten assemblies in civil aircraft. However, poor machinability of CFRP/Ti stacks in combination with the inhomogeneous behavior of CFRP and Ti alloy face manufacturing and scientific community with a problem of defining significant factors and conditions for ensuring hole quality in the CFRP/Ti alloy stacks. Herein, we investigate the effects of drilling parameters on drilling temperature and hole quality in CFRP/Ti alloy stacks by applying an artificial neuron network (ANN). We varied cutting speed, feed rate, and time delay factors according to the factorial design L₉ Taguchi orthogonal array and measured the drilling temperature, hole diameter, and out of roundness by using a thermocouple and coordinate measuring machine methods for ANN analysis. The results show that the drilling temperature was sensitive to the effect of stack material layer, cutting speed, and time delay factors. The hole diameter was mainly affected by feed, stack material layer, and time delay, while out of roundness was influenced by the time delay, stack material layer, and cutting speed. Overall, ANN can be used for the identification of the drilling parameters–hole quality relationship.

The Influence of Cutting Parameters on Plastic Deformation and Chip Compression during the Turning of C45 Medium Carbon Steel and 62SiMnCr4 Tool Steel

The paper deals with the issue of cutting zone and chip compression. The aim was to analyse the microstructure transverse section of the cutting zone on a metallographic cut, due to determined values of chip compression and plastic deformation, which affect the cutting process efficiency. The tested cutting tool material was coated with cemented carbide. The selected workpiece materials were C45 medium carbon steel of ISO grade and 62SiMnCr4 tool steel of ISO (W.Nr. 1.2101) grade. In the experiments, a DMG CTX alpha 500 turning centre was used. The cutting speed and feed were varied, and the depth of the cut was kept constant during the turning. The plastic deformation and chip compression determine the efficiency of the cutting process. The higher compression requires more work to perform the process and, therefore, it requires more energy for doing so. With the increase of the cutting speed, the deformation for C45 steel is decreased. The rapid deformation reduction was observed when the cutting speed was increased from 145 m/min to 180 m/min. Generally, deformation is decreasing with the increase of the feed. Only at a cutting speed of 145 m/min was the deformation elevation observed, when the feed was increased from 0.4 mm to 0.6 mm. During the turning of the 62SiMnCr4 tool steel we observed an error value at a cutting speed of 145 m/min and a feed of 0.4 mm was the middle cutting parameter. However, feed dependence was clear: With an increase of the feed, the plastic deformation was decreasing. This decreasing was more rapid with the increasing of the cutting speed. Besides plastic deformation, there was analysed chip compression as well. With the increasing of the cutting speed, there was a decrease of the chip compression. Due to a lack of information in the area of the chip compression and the plastic deformation in the cutting process, we decided to investigate the cutting zone for the turning of tool steels 62SiMnCr4, which was compared with the reference steel C45. The results could be applied to increase the efficiency of the process and improvement of the surface integrity.

Experimental Investigation of Suitable Cutting Conditions of Dry Drilling into High-Strength Structural Steel

Dry machining is one of the main ways to reduce the environmental burden of the machining process and reduce the negative effect of the cutting fluid and aerosols on operators. In addition, dry machining can reduce overall machining costs and, in the case of large workpieces, reduce the extra work associated with removing residual cutting fluid from the workpiece and adjacent area. For high-strength structural steel products, it is typical to drill holes with larger diameters of around 20 mm. Therefore, this work is devoted to the investigation of the dry drilling process carried out on a workpiece made of S960QL steel with a helical drill with a diameter of 21 mm. The aim was to find suitable cutting conditions for dry drilling with regard to process stability and workpiece quality. An experiment performed with a coolant served as a comparison base. A dry drilling experiment was performed with cutting speeds from 30 to 70 m·min⁻¹ and feeds from 0.1 to 0.3 mm·rev⁻¹, and with the results of this experiment, the same experiment with flood cooling was performed. During the drilling process, spindle torque values were recorded using the indirect spindle current recording method. The macroscopic chip morphology was studied to understand the cutting process. The chip thickness ratio was measured, as well as the maximum diameter of spiral chips. On the final workpiece, the qualitative and dimensional parameters of the holes were evaluated, such as the diameter, cylindricity and surface roughness, depending on the change in the cutting conditions and cutting environment. Evaluation of the obtained data led to the following conclusions. When drilling the S960QL material, there is only a very small increase in the drilling torque during dry drilling compared to drilling with cutting fluid. The increase in friction demonstrated by the chip thickness coefficient is significant. The influence of the environment on the dimensional accuracy showed a tendency for a slight increase in the holes’ diameters during dry machining. In comparison, the cylindricity of the dry-drilled holes shows a lower deviation than the holes drilled with cutting fluid. The surface roughness of the holes after dry drilling is affected by the increased friction of the outgoing chips, despite the resulting parameters being very good due to the drilling technology standards. This work provides a comprehensive view of the dry drilling process under defined conditions, and the results represent suitable cutting conditions to achieve a stable cutting process and a suitable quality of drilled holes.

Temperature-Dependent Dynamic Characteristics of Carbon-Fiber-Reinforced Plastic for Different Spectral Loading Patterns

The dynamic properties of carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP) can be efficiently estimated through a modal damping coefficient and a resonance frequency, and the modal parameters can be calculated using a frequency response function (FRF). The modal parameters used in an CFRP FRF are influenced by the carbon fiber direction, temperature, and spectral loading pattern, as well as the operating conditions. In this study, three parameters—temperature, spectral loading pattern, and carbon fiber direction—were selected as the influential factors for CFRP dynamics, and the sensitivity index formulation was derived from the parameter-dependent FRF of the CFRP structure. The derivatives of the parameter-dependent FRF over the three considered parameters were calculated from the measured modal parameters, and the dynamic sensitivity of the CFRP specimens was explored from the sensitivity index results for five different directional CFRP specimens. The acceleration response of a simple CFRP specimen was obtained via a uniaxial excitation test at temperatures ranging from −8 to 105 °C for the following two spectral loading cases: harmonic and random.