Effect of Cryogenic Grinding on Fatigue Life of Additively Manufactured Maraging Steel

Additive manufacturing (AM) is replacing conventional manufacturing techniques due to its ability to manufacture complex structures with near-net shape and reduced material wastage. However, the poor surface integrity of the AM parts deteriorates the service life of the components. The AM parts should be subjected to post-processing treatment for improving surface integrity and fatigue life. In this research, maraging steel is printed using direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) process and the influence of grinding on the fatigue life of this additively manufactured material was investigated. For this purpose, the grinding experiments were performed under two different grinding environments such as dry and cryogenic conditions using a cubic boron nitride (CBN) grinding wheel. The results revealed that surface roughness could be reduced by about 87% under cryogenic condition over dry grinding. The fatigue tests carried out on the additive manufactured materials exposed a substantial increase of about 170% in their fatigue life when subjected to cryogenic grinding.