Pulsed Magnetic Field Treatment of WC-TiC-Co Cutting Inserts for Improved Microstructure and Cutting Performance

Abstract

In the presented study, a pulsed magnetic field (PMT) with different magnetic field intensities was used to treat the WC-TiC-Co inserts, and for improved properties, microstructure and cutting performance of insert were investigated. The result shows that PMT can greatly reduce the cutting force, flank wear and notch wear. An approximately 17% decrease in the cutting force in the last cut is achieved along with the reductions of 57 and 20% for the flank wear (VB) and notch wear (VN), respectively, and Vickers hardness increases slightly when the optimum process parameter of 0.5 T is used. PMT significantly improves the microstructure of the insert by enhancing the martensite transformation of Co phase from α-Co to ε-Co and multiplication of the dislocations. Meanwhile, the presence of the field increases the percentage of the low-angle boundary misorientations for the HCP phase from 33.85 to 57.87% and reduces the anisotropy of the texture, which leads to the formation of a uniformly refined microstructure. The presented study indicates that PMT can be an effective way to produce high-performance cutting tools to suit engineering applications.