Papers by Author: Ahmed A.D. Sarhan

Abstract: Electrical discharge machining (EDM) is a non-conventional machining technique that is well-known for use in fabricating dies and molds owing to machinability of high hardness materials. Although the electro-thermal mechanism of EDM offers many advantages over other available machining methods, its sluggish nature limits the wide application of such machines for mass production. In this research, adding graphite powder to dielectric is proposed to improve EDM performance factors. Material removal rate (MRR) and average surface roughness (Ra) have been monitored and evaluated after addition of graphite powder to dielectric in electrical discharge milling and sinking. It is found that the presence of powder particles in dielectric fluid enhances the MRR steadily up to ~11 and ~17% for milling and sinking process, respectively. Moreover, the highest enhancement if Ra is ~31% at 1g/l graphite powder concentration for electrical discharge milling and up to ~11% for sinking process. Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) is used to inspect the machined surfaces. The surfaces machined with graphite powder mixed appear significantly unlike the surfaces machined in pure dielectric. Adding powder to dielectric is found to increase the machined surface hardness by ~26%, from 240 to 302 HV.

Abstract: The objective of this study was to develop clad layer by producing a Silicon Carbide (SiC) particle reinforced Metal Matrix Composite (MMC) using the iron based alloys (P25) as the matrix material. Direct laser cladding was carried out by melting the clad materials and depositing them onto a mild steel substrate. A two gravity feed system was used in this study which contained of SiC particles and iron based powder as separate powders. The intention was to melt the iron based powder and incorporate the SiC particles. Decomposition of SiC particles was observed and only a few SiC particles were found in the clad matrix. Microhardness results showed that laser clad layer had higher hardness which more than 1000 HV and hence potentially better wear resistance that base material. However, most of the SiC had evaporated which created porosity in the melt pool due to the decomposition of SiC and the resultant gas which was trapped in clad layer did not have enough time to escape from the melt pool due to the rapid solidification. Therefore, a blown powder technique is recommended for overcome this problem.