3rd International Conference on Advances in Engineering Sciences & Applied Mathematics (ICAESAM’2015) March 23-24, 2015 London (UK)
Examining the Role of Cutting Fluids in
Machining AISI 1040 Steel Using Tungsten
Carbide Insert under Minimal Quantity
Lubrication Condition
Ajay Vardhaman B. S 1, M. Amarnath 2, Durwesh Jhodkar 2, J. Ramkumar1 and H. Chelladurai2

employing cutting fluids. Cutting fluids have been used
extensively in metal cutting operations for the last 200 years.
There are several types of cutting fluids available in the market
which are used to carry away the heat generated at the cutting
zone [2]. Enormous use of mineral oil based cutting fluids
creates adverse effects on environment and health problems to
the operators [3]. Due to an increased awareness of
environmental and health issues, industry has made efforts to
eliminate or reduce the consumption of the cutting fluid. By
implementing dry machining and minimal quantity of
lubrication (MQL), cutting fluid consumption can be reduced
[4]. On the other hand there is an increased interest in
biodegradable lubricants because of various environmental
related issues throughout the world. Vegetable oils are
possible sources of base oil for environment- friendly cutting
fluids. Various studies in the past have shown the suitability of
vegetable oil for hydraulic oils, metal-cutting fluids and
transmission oils [5]. Dhar et al. (2006) reported the
effectiveness of MQL to reduce the tool wear and to enhance
the surface finish in turning of AISI 4340 steel using the
uncoated tool inserts. The comparative study was carried out
under dry and flood cutting conditions. Results showed that
MQL jet provided a reduction in tool wear and better surface
finish, mainly through reduction in the cutting zone
temperature and favorable changes in the chip-tool and worktool interaction. Varadarajan et al. (2002) investigated new
cutting techniques in turning operation to achieve the objective
of hard turning with minimal fluid application (HTMF).
Multicoated hard metal inserts were used to turn AISI 4340
steel which was hardened to 46 HRC. The overall performance
during minimal cutting fluid application was found to be
superior to that during dry turning and conventional wet
turning operation in terms of cutting force, tool life, surface
finish, cutting temperature and tool–chip contact length.
Babur et al. (2011) conducted the experimental studies on
the performances of the newly developed vegetable based
cutting fluids (VBCFs), such as sunflower and canola oil
including different percentage of extreme pressure (EP)
additive and two commercial cutting fluids (CFs), such as
semi-synthetic and mineral cutting fluids in turning process.
VBCFs showed better performance as compared to the
reference CFs in terms of reduced surface roughness, cutting
Abstract— In all machining operations, tool wear is a natural
phenomenon. Excessive wear on cutting tools alter the dimensions of
manufactured components, which result increase in scrap levels
thereby incurring additional costs. Though cutting fluids are widely
employed to carry away the heat generated at the tool-work piece
interface, their applications have several adverse effects on ecology
and the health of workers. Attempts have already been initiated to
control the pollution problem using minimal quantity lubrication
(MQL) method which also leads to economical benefits and work
piece/tool/machine cleaning cycle time. In the present work,
experimental investigations were carried out to investigate the role of
MQL by vegetable oil on cutting forces and tool wear in tuning AISI
1040 steel using tungsten carbide cutting tool insert. The results
revealed that, the performance of MQL by coconut oil found to be
superior to that of dry turning, conventional wet turning and MQL by
soluble oil on the basis of cutting force and tool life.
Keywords — Carbide, Coconut oil, Cutting force, Tool, Wear.
I. INTRODUCTION
M
ACHINING is widely used in a variety of industries
such as automotive, textile, aerospace and other
manufacturing industries. During a machining process, a
substantial part of the energy is converted into heat energy
through the friction generated between the tool and the work
piece. The rapidly accumulated heat causes the temperature of
the tool and work piece contact zone to rise at a faster rate,
which directly affects the surface finish of the product [1].
Such high cutting zone temperatures can be controlled by
Amarnath Muniyappa2, Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical
Engineering, PDPM IIITDM, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India. (e-mail:
[email protected]).
Ajay Vardhaman B.S1, Research Scholar, Material Science Programme,
IIT Kanpur, U.P India. (e-mail: [email protected]).
Durwesh Jhodkar2, Research Scholar, Department of Mechanical
Engineering, PDPM IIITDM, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India. (e-mail:
[email protected]).
J. Ramkumar1, Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical
Engineering and Material Science Programme, IIT Kanpur, U.P, India. (email: [email protected]).
H. Chelladurai2, Assistant Professor, Department of
Mechanical
Engineering, PDPM IIITDM, Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, India. (e-mail:
[email protected]).
http://dx.doi.org/10.15242/IIE.E0315066
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3rd International Conference on Advances in Engineering Sciences & Applied Mathematics (ICAESAM’2015) March 23-24, 2015 London (UK)
forces and tool wear. The results indicated that 8% of EP
added in canola based cutting fluid performed better than the
rest. Shashidhara and Jayaram (2010) made a review on the
various industrial applications of vegetable oils. Authors have
highlighted the performance of vegetable oils as emulsions and
straight cutting oils for machining of various materials.
Vegetable oils were found to be promising alternatives for
mineral based oils due to their environmental friendly
characteristics. Anthony and Adithan (2009) carried out the
experimental investigation on cemented carbide tool inserts in
machining of AISI 304 stainless steel, under various
machining parameters with three different cutting fluids.
Effectiveness of cutting fluids in reducing the tool wear and
improving the surface finish was found by comparing the
relative performance. Results revealed that, the coconut oil
was found to be a better cutting fluid than the conventional
mineral oils. Khan et al. (2009) presented the effects of
minimum quality lubrication (MQL) by vegetable oil based
cutting fluid in the turning performance of AISI 9310 steel.
Authors highlighted that the MQL by vegetable oil was
performed much better compared to the dry and wet
machining. Results showed a substantial reduction in cutting
zone temperature, favorable chip formation and chip-tool
interaction. The main objective of the present work is to study
the performance of MQL by coconut oil as a lubricant in the
turning of AISI 1040 steel using tungsten carbide tool insert.
Results were compared to highlight the effectiveness of MQL
with that of dry and wet machining conditions.
Fig.1. Schematic diagram of experimental setup
TABLE I
EXPERIMENTAL DETAILS
Work Specimen
Material
Si = 0.2-0.3%, S = 0.025%, P =0.015%),
II. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP AND PROCEDURE
Turning tests using AISI 1040 steel as the work piece
material were carried out on HMT centre lathe with 20 kW
spindle power and a maximum spindle speed of 2100 rpm.
Bars of 50 mm diameter and 400 mm cutting length were
machined using tungsten carbide cutting tools. Four cutting
conditions i.e. dry, wet, MQL by soluble oil and MQL by
coconut oil were considered in the present work. In wet cutting
condition, soluble oil was used as a cutting fluid. The MQL
was supplied at high pressure and speed, impinged through the
nozzle at the tool work piece interface so that the coolant
reaches close to the chip-tool and work-tool interfaces.
The cutting speed, feed and depth of cut were kept constant for
all the four cutting conditions. The time duration of 50 minutes
was considered for each test condition. Schematic view of the
experimental setup is shown in Fig. 1.
The cutting insert was withdrawn at regular intervals to
study the pattern and extent of wear, which was examined
using USB port optical microscope. A tool post dynamometer
(KISTLER 9257 A) was used to acquire cutting forces. The
cutting force signals were amplified using charge amplifier
(KISTLER 5233A) and fed in to a personal computer
equipped with Kistler Dynoware software. Complete
experimentation details are given in Table 1.
http://dx.doi.org/10.15242/IIE.E0315066
AISI 1040 (C = 0.36-0.45%,Mn = 0.6-1%,
Size
ø50mm × 400mm
Hardness
30 ± 2 HRC
Process Parameter
Cutting velocity
Feed
Depth of cut
Environment
Flow rate of
V= 114 m/min
S=0.10 mm/rev
t = 0.5 mm
Dry, Wet, MQL by soluble and coconut oil
lubricant
Wet (flood cooling)
200ml/min
MQL (soluble oil,
coconut oil)
60 ml/hr
Machine tool
Lathe Machine
HMT Company, India
Motor Capacity
Spindle speed
Cutting tool
20 kW
59-2100 rpm
DCMT11T304, Carbide insert
Tool Holder
SDJCR 2020 K11 WIDAX
USB Optical
Microscope
2 M Pixels
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
The machining temperature at the cutting zone is an
important index of machinability and needs to be controlled as
far as possible. During machining of ductile materials, heat is
generated at the primary and secondary deformation zones.
Furthermore, rubbing produces heat at work- tool interface.
All such heat sources substantially influence the chip
formation mode, cutting forces and tool life. With the progress
of machining, the cutting tools attain crater wear at the rake
face and flank wear at the clearance surfaces, due to
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3rd International Conference on Advances in Engineering Sciences & Applied Mathematics (ICAESAM’2015) March 23-24, 2015 London (UK)
continuous interaction and rubbing with the chips and the work
surfaces respectively [6], [9]. The crater wear is generally
formed some distance up the rake face where cutting
temperature is maximum. It is well known that abrasion wear
is the primary cause of cutting tool flank wear, whereas the
chemical interactions between the chip and the tool causes
crater wear. During a high speed machining of steel using
carbide tools, the tools usually undergo slow crater wear at
their rake surface, mainly due to plastic deformation and pull
out of the deformed grains in addition to abrasion. Due to high
chemical stability of carbide tools, chemical wear due to
adhesion and diffusion is less significant for this combination
of tool and the work piece [10].
The optical microscope images of the crater wear of the
worn inserts are shown in Fig 2 (a) - (d). These inserts were
used over a period of 50 minutes in dry, wet, MQL by soluble
oil and MQL by coconut oil machining conditions
respectively. The results of the present work indicate a
substantial reduction in tool wear, which enhanced the tool life
by the application of MQL by coconut oil cutting conditions.
(a)
during machining AISI 1040 steel using tungsten carbide
cutting tool insert under dry, wet, MQL by soluble oil and
MQL by coconut oil respectively
Fig. 3 Growth of principal flank wear with machining time
Principal flank wear verses time plot highlighted the
effective wear rate at the prescribed cutting speed and feedrate under four machining environments. Unique
characteristics of coconut oil such as thermal degradation, high
pour point, oxidation stability etc. result in reduced flank wear
during machining. Further, the reduction in flank wear can be
attributed to reduction in the flank temperature, by applying
high pressure jet of coconut oil at the chip-tool interface,
which resulted a decrease in abrasion wear by retaining tool
hardness as well as adhesion and diffusion types of wear.
Hence vegetable-based oils have superior lubricity properties
and also greater wettability characteristics.
On the other hand Fig. 3 shows insignificant effect of flood
cutting environment on the growth of tool wear as compared to
dry machining condition. This may be attributed to ineffective
coolant and lubrication action of conventional cutting fluids.
(b)
(c)
(d)
Fig.2 Images of crater wear at the end of tool life (a) Dry machining
(b) Wet machining (c) MQL by conventional cutting fluid (d) MQL
by coconut oil.
Generally, the crater wear is always accompanied with the
flank wear. This flank wear is the most important because it
causes increase in the cutting forces and the related problems.
The critical flank wear size recommended by ISO for tool
made of different materials is 0.3 mm for finishing operations
and 0.6 mm for roughing operations [11]. Fig. 3 shows the
growth in the principal flank wear, on the main cutting edge
http://dx.doi.org/10.15242/IIE.E0315066
Fig. 4 Variation of tangential force with machining time
Wear on cutting tool inserts causes an increase in cutting
force components. As the cutting proceeds with time,
magnitude of the cutting forces increases. Fig.4 shows the
variation of cutting forces with machining time. It is observed
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3rd International Conference on Advances in Engineering Sciences & Applied Mathematics (ICAESAM’2015) March 23-24, 2015 London (UK)
cutting tools‖, Materials and Manufacturing Processes, 17, pp. 651–670,
2002.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1081/AMP-120016089
[11] ISO 3685, 1977, Tool-life testing with single-point turning tools, First
Edition, Annex G, p. 41.
that the values of cutting forces are lower during MQL by
coconut oil and soluble oil when compared to dry and
conventional wet machining conditions. This is due to the high
pressure injection of the fluid with high velocity, which
facilitate better penetration of the cutting fluid between the
chip-tool and work-tool interface resulting in the reduction of
friction.
IV. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Experimental investigations have been carried out to
investigate the role of vegetable oil as a metal cutting fluid to
reduce cutting force, tool wear and improve product quality
during cylindrical turning of AISI 1040 steel. Results revealed
that, the conventional cutting flood and dry cutting condition
result excessive tool wear and increase in cutting forces.
However, MQL by coconut oil and soluble oil showed a
significant increase in tool life mainly by reducing the cutting
temperature, which improves the chip-tool interaction and
maintains sharpness of the cutting edges. Further,
investigations revealed that MQL by coconut oil result in
lower cutting forces and tool wear than that of MQL by
soluble oil. This was due to the enhanced cooling and
lubricating ability of the vegetable oils.
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