Machining performance and sustainability analysis of PMEDM process using green dielectric fluid

摘要

In the present work, an effort is made to evaluate the machining performance of the nano-powder mixed rotary electrical discharge machining (EDM) process by replacing the conventional EDM oil with environmentally friendly biodegradable Jatropha curcas oil (JCO). The performance of nano-powder mixed rotary EDM using JCO dielectric is compared with the conventional EDM process. Peak current, pulse on time, pulse off time, nano-powder concentration, and tool rpm are essential parameters to examine the material removal rate (MRR) and surface roughness (SR) of the EN-31 die steel. It is revealed from the results that the proposed modified EDM process shows a 73 improvement in MRR and 50 reduction in SR as compared to the conventional EDM process using EDM oil. Further, surface morphology, recast layer thickness (RLT) analysis, and microhardness analysis reveals that multi-wall carbon nanotube mixed rotary EDM using JCO shows small micro holes, no micro crack, smaller size debris deposition, lower RLT, and smaller microhardness of recast layer as compared to EDM oil. Finally, the sustainability indexes (SI) analysis result reveals that JCO is environmentally safe and economically justified due to a 9.92 lower SI value as compared to EDM oil.