Environmentally Friendly Machining for Hardened Steels

Abstract

Cutting fluids are used in the metal machining processes for the purpose of lubrication, reduction of temperature in the metal-tool interface during cutting, and enhancement in the tool life. However, the use of cutting fluid not only increases the manufacturing costs but also pollutes the environment and has detrimental effects on the health of the machine operators. Now-a-days industries are giving high importance and priority to the environmental issues for the sake of society and humankind in a broader sense. Therefore there is a necessity of development of environmentally friendly metal machining processes which will reduce or completely eliminate the use of cutting fluids. In this paper, hard cutting–a machining process that can be performed without using cutting fluid has been investigated theoretically and experimentally and environmental as well as economic benefits evolved from the use of such technology have been presented. It has been observed that the average geometrical accuracy parameters; circularity, cylindricity, and straightness achieved in hard cutting are in the range of 4–6 microns as against 7–8 microns in grinding. The experimental results substantiate that hard cutting is capable of producing comparable quality parameters and lower cost economy in comparison to grinding.