Experimental Investigation on Air Cooling of GCr15

Air cooling is a near dry machining method, which cools cutting area and evacuates chips using low temperature cold wind instead of cutting liquid. It can decrease tool wear, increase tool life, reduce machining cost and bring no chemical pollution. In this paper, air cooling test was carried on, in which vortex tube was used for cooling and high hardness bear steel GCr15 was machined by PCBN tool. Experiment results indicated that cold air from vortex tube has a significant effect on cutting force, cutting temperature and chip formation process. This paper’s conclusions will have a great reference value for the practical application of air cooling technology.