Sustainable Face-Machining of a Ti-6Al-4V Rod under Cooling Environments of Liquid Nitrogen and CO2 Snow

Abstract

A continual rise in the usage of titanium alloy for structural applications calls for sustainability in its shaping processes. Machining is the most commonly utilized process of the manufacturing domain. As the temperature dependent modes of tool damage seriously limit the material removal rates in the machining of titanium alloys, cryogenic approaches of heat dissipation are required to make the process sustainable. The paper focuses on application of two kinds of cryogenic fluids, liquid nitrogen and carbon dioxide snow, for a reduction in tool wear rate, work surface roughness, specific cutting energy and cutting forces in a continuous machining process. Moreover, the effect of changing depth of cut in machining a given volume of the work material without a change in processing time is also quantified. The analyses of the experimental data reveal that both the cryogenic approaches yielded positive results with respect to all the sustainability measures.