Micro-grinding of Micro-groove Array on Tool Rake Surface for Dry Cutting of Titanium Alloy

A micro-grinding approach is proposed to fabricate micro-groove array on tool rake surface. These micro-grooves were used to rapidly dissipate cutting chips and heat from cutting zone for eco-cutting of titanium alloy without any coolant. This tool is called micro-grooved tool. The objective is to replace chemical and high-energy-beam etching approaches because they have not yet been able to control micron-scale groove shape accuracy In this study, a superhard diamond wheel v-tip was employed to perform a micro-grinding through a traverse grinding. After micro-grinding, these micro-grooves were characterized by the mean depth of 155.1 mu m, the mean form error PV of 7.8 mu m and the mean tip radius of 45.6 mu m. Firstly, traditional plate tool, orthogonal micro-grooved tool and diagonal micro-grooved tool were employed to perform a dry turning of titanium alloy respectively; then, tool wear, surface roughness, chip topography and shear angle were investigated. It is shown that the sharpened diamond wheel V-tip is valid to grinding micro-groove array on tool rake surface without any burrs. Furthermore, the micro-grooved tools may reduce the cutting sparks, tool wear, 3D chip size and chip saw-tooth size compared to traditional plate tool. The diagonal micro-grooved tool may decrease tool wear by 6.7% and surface roughness by 37.3% and increase shear angle by 24.3% against orthogonal micro-grooved tool, respectively This is because the diagonal micro-grooving direction is identical to the cutting chip flowing on tool rake surface. It is confirmed that the diagonal micro-grooved tool is applicable to a stable dry cutting of titanium alloy