Influence of Milling Process Parameters on Machined Surface Quality of Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) Composites Using Taguchi Analysis and Grey Relational Analysis

The article presents the milled surface quality of Uni-Directional Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer (UD-CFRP) composites from Taguchi’s and grey relational analysis. The novelty is demonstrating the possibility of detecting the surface defects in polymer composites during milling using SEM analysis. The material used for this study is UD-CFRP composite laminates and made by hand-layup process. All the milling operations were carried out using a solid tungsten carbide end milling tool and experiments conducted on CNC milling machine. Taguchi L9, 3-level orthogonal array was considered for experimentation. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was conducted to explore the significance of each individual input process parameters on multiple performance characteristics. Optimal process parameters are thoroughly validated by grey relational grade achieved by the grey relational analysis for multi performance characteristics. Finally, experimental results were correlated and analyzed with scanning electron micrographs using Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM).