Finishing and Wear analysis of 3D-Printed Workpiece Through Centrifugal Force-Assisted Abrasive Flow Machining

Abstract

The rapid population growth has raised the need of industrialization which has opened a new horizon for the additive manufacturing, especially in the area of 3D printing technology. 3D printing has immersed as the additive manufacturing technique which finds its application in every domain including toys, confectionaries, biomedical, electronics, aerospace and automobile. But achieving the desirable surface finish is a difficult task for 3D-printed material especially poly lactic acid (PLA). Due to less material removal in traditional abrasive flow machining, the scope of the current investigation is to finish 3D-printed hollow cylindrical workpiece made of PLA material by Fused deposition method using Centrifugal force-assisted abrasive flow Machining process. The investigation was carried out to determine the optimum percentage improvement in surface finish and surface micro-hardness using Response surface methodology. Using an optical profilometer and a micro-hardness tester, the surface characteristics of the workpiece were examined. Additionally, wear modeling was carried out using the Ansys^® software, and the outcomes were confirmed through tests using Reye–Archard–Khrushchev wear law. The simulation results were in good confirmation of experimental results with total debris of 1.4 mg. The findings of the investigation indicate an average improvement in surface quality of 39.27%. The experimental results show that the major influence on enhanced R_a and micro-hardness comes from CFG rod rotation. Also, the ideal percentage improvements in surface finish and micro-hardness are found to be 35.34% and 41.29 HV, respectively.