Experimental Investigations on The Effect of Tungsten Content on the Machining Behaviour of Tungsten Heavy Alloys

The present work attempts to assess the machinability of tungsten heavy alloys (WHAs) with varying tungsten content in terms of different machining characteristics such as chip thickness, material removal rate, cutting force and surface roughness under varied cutting conditions. The feed rate is found to have major influence on the machining characteristics; whereas the effect of rake angle appears to be marginal. With increase in W content both cutting force and material removal rate increase whereas surface roughness decreases. Since WHAs are difficult to machine, an additional objective of the study is to optimize machining parameters. An optimal balance of the experimental cutting parameters using Grey relational analysis has been achieved, which can be effectively employed for the machining of the alloys with close dimensional tolerances and desirable surface finish.