The electo-chemical machining process was actually derived from electro-polishing or electroplating process already being used in the year 1911 by E Shpitalsky. In the beginning of 20th century much research took place in USA, Russia and Western Europe for developing electroplating as a machining process. Success came in 1928 when Russian scientists started flushing the electrolyte and thus facilitating the material removal. The first traditional model of ECM came into existence in the year 1959 introduced by Anocut Engineering Company situated in USA. In mid-1960’s much development took place in Europe in electrochemical technologies. In mid-1980’s passivation of oxygen contained electrolyte through impulse processing was introduced. Later much work is carried out in improving the surface finish obtained by the process. The general working principle of ECM process is shown in the figure below.
In the 21st century the process was tested and modified for various difficult to cut materials and was successful. The present research is based on microsecond ECM machining which can produce very small intricate shapes. As shown in the figure, two electrodes were inserted in an electrolytic solution where anode is connected to the workpiece and cathode to the tool. Then the current is passed resulting into electrolysis process and the material removal takes place by electrolysis. The machining is accurate and surface finish obtained is very good. The process is slow but provides with high degree of accuracy.
No comments:
Post a Comment