Comparison Between Cemented Carbide and PCD Tools on Machinability of a High Silicon Aluminum Alloy

The high content of silicon of aluminum casting alloys challenges the tool life of conventional cemented carbide inserts, and polycrystalline diamond (PCD) tools appear as an interesting material to machine these alloys because they improve substantially the durability of cutting tools and consequently the productivity of machining. However, the surface roughness, cutting forces and chip morphology are equally important factors in machining evaluation. Therefore, an experimental study is performed aiming at comparing the performance of cemented carbide and PCD tools taking into account cutting forces, surface roughness and chip morphology, under dry longitudinal turning, performed for the AlSi9Cu3 alloy produced by permanent mold casting process. Different chip breaker geometries were also considered, and their influence on the referred parameters was also investigated. Analysis of variance was employed to study the different contributions of inserts, cutting speed, feed rate, depth of cut and their interactions in machinability performance. The results show low cutting forces and better results for surface roughness for uncoated cemented carbide tools, with simpler chip breakers and flat rake face PCD tool, but an efficient chip control was obtained for inserts with small grooves with high cutting forces and power consumption. Nevertheless, the feed rate and depth of cut have the highest influence on the machinability performance of the alloy under investigation.