Micro-ECM Drilling of Copper Alloy and Taguchi Optimization

Abstract:

The objective of the study is to conduct experiments to investigate the performance of Electrochemical Micromachining (EMM) process to drill micro-holes on Copper alloy and analyze the parameters to optimize by Taguchi method. An EMM setup developed in-house is used to conduct the experiments. Copper alloy as workpiece, Stainless Steel needle of sharp conical edge as tool and Sodium Nitrate as electrolyte are used. A Pulse generator is used to supply pulsed current. The input parameters analyzed for optimization are Voltage, Pulse on-time and Electrolyte Concentration. The Material Removal Rate (MRR) and Overcut are taken as output parameters to study the process performance. The experiment was designed according to L9 Orthogonal Array (OA) of Taguchi design. The observations have shown that the MRR increases and the accuracy decreases when the level of input value for any parameter is increased. The process parameters are optimized using Taguchi Analysis.

• Periodical: Applied Mechanics and Materials (Volumes 766-767)
• Pages: 818-824
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.766-767.818
• Online since: June 2015
• Authors: Venkatajalapathy Subburam*, Sengottuvelu Ramesh
• Keywords: ANOVA, Copper Alloy, Electrochemical Micromachining, NaNO₃, S/N Ratio, Taguchi Analysis

References

[1] B. Bhattacharya, B. Doloi and P.S. Sridhar (2001) Electrochemical micro-machining: new possibilities for micro-manufacturing, Journal of Materials Processing Technology, 113, 301-305.

DOI: 10.1016/s0924-0136(01)00629-x

[2] M. Kock, V. Kirchner, R. Schuster , Electrochemical Micromachining with ultrashort voltage pulses – a versatile method with lithographic precision", Electrochemica Acta 48 (2003) 3213 - 3219.

DOI: 10.1016/s0013-4686(03)00374-8

[3] B. Bhattacharyya and J. Munda (2003) Experimental investigation into electrochemical micromachining (EMM) process, Journal of Materials Processing Technology, 140, 287–291.

DOI: 10.1016/s0924-0136(03)00722-2

[4] Zhaoyang Zhang, Di Zhu, Ningsong Qu, Theoritical and experimental investigation on electrochemical micromachining, Microsyst Technol (2007) 13: 607 -612.

DOI: 10.1007/s00542-006-0369-7

[5] J. Kozak, 2004, Thermal models of pulse electro-chemical machining, Bulletin of the Polish Academy of Sciences Technical Sciences, Vol 52, No. 4, 2004, pp.313-320.

[6] R. Thanigaivelan and RM. Arunachalam (2013). Experimental study on the influence of tool electrode tip shape on electrochemical micromachining of 304 stainless steel, Materials and manufacturing processes 25: 1181 – 1185, (2010).

DOI: 10.1080/10426914.2010.508806

[7] V. Subburam, S. Ramesh, RM. Arunachalam and R. Thanigaivelan, Effect of Acidified Electrolyte on the performance of Electrochemical Micromachining, Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Advances in Materials Processing and Characterisation (AMPC 2013), vol. II, pp.799-806.

[8] Malapati Manoj Kumar Reddy: Influence of Pulse Period and Duty Ratio on Electrochemical Micro Machining (EMM) Characteristics, International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Applications, 2013: 1(4): 78-86.

DOI: 10.11648/j.ijmea.20130104.11

[9] Mohan Sen, H.S. Shan A review of electrochemical macro- to micro-hole drilling processes. Int. J of Machine Tools & Manufacture 2005; 45: 137–152.

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijmachtools.2004.08.005