Machinability improvement in milling of SiCf/SiC composites based on laser controllable ablation pretreatment

The poor machinability of SiCf/SiC composites greatly limits its application and promotion. The laser-induced ablation products of SiCf/SiC composites are powdery, loose and porous. Milling of laser ablated samples demonstrated that the force and heat were almost negligible when milling ablation products. Accordingly, a laser ablation pretreatment milling (LAPM) process of SiCf/SiC composites was proposed. Under the LAPM process, after the laser ablation treatment with controllable depth, the cutting allowance could be achieved in only one pass, which greatly improved the machining efficiency compared with the conventional milling process. The material removal rate was greatly improved on the premise of ensuring the machining quality. Taking the milling of tensile specimens as an example, compared with conventional milling, the total processing time of the specimen was reduced by 31.29 % by LAPM process. Therefore, LAPM provides a potential feasible process scheme for greatly improving the machinability and machining efficiency of SiCf/SiC composites.