Projektinitiativ #83: Materials variation: a methodological approach to assessing machinability

We realize that with today’s diversification on the supply side along with the increased level of using material recyclables, variation in material is a greater problem than ever before in the industrial end-use. The basic understanding of material variation exists, but a methodology to deal with this variation in real production is not readily available. In this research, differences in both microstructure and deformation will be investigated for different work materials: steel, cast iron, and aluminium.

Relation to the work program:

• Understanding how alloy composition and other aspects of materials design affect machining performance.
• Methods for theoretical and experimental modeling need to be developed in order to increase the possibility to predict and control processes, especially when introducing new materials into production.
• Identify the thresholds of recycled material fraction affecting machinability, especially with respect to batch-to-batch variations.
• Utilizing knowledge from materials development and functional requirements, and developing better measurement and control methods based on modern IT and tailored to the industrial end-users.
• Idea developed based on real industrial needs within the Chalmers Centre for Metal Cutting Research (MCR), closely linking universities, institutes and industry.

Objectives

• Identify interrelations between (1) materials microstructure, chemical composition, key mechanical properties and (2) machinability.
• Identify available experimental and analytical methods which can be used to assess the material variations in real production.
• Develop machinability guidelines to-be-provided with different material batches.
• Develop guidelines for narrowing tolerances of specific material parameters.

Idea registered by the support of:
• Volvo Group
• Volvo Car Corporation
• Sandvik Coromant
• Uddeholm Holding
• Swerea IVF
• KTH Royal Institute of Technology

Namn Peter Krajnik
Organisation Chalmers University of Technology