Cryogenic assisted machining of hard to cut materials

a review

Abstract

Machining processes have undergone lot of changes over the last several years to improve the quality and productivity. There are several important problems, faced by machinists when machining so called ‘difficult-to-machine’ materials, which includes metals, alloys, composites, rubber, refractory materials etc. These include excessive tool wear, temperature, severe work hardening, chip formation and breakage, bad surface finish and surface integrity. Cryogenic cooling is a relatively new cooling technique explored by researchers and industries all over the world to machine these materials and reduce the associated problems. There has been lot of research articles available in this domain. In this regard, this paper reviews research articles published during 2000 to 2018, with focus on introduction of cryogenics to machining, some details of difficult to machine materials, effect of cryogenics on surface finish, tool wear, chip formation and breakage, microstructure and hardness. About 108 articles have been reviewed and salient conclusions are drawn at the end of the paper, which establishes the fact that cryogenic machining is going to be an important machining technique, which will be adopted by industries to produce better quality products from machining of these materials and promote ‘sustainability in machining’.