Study on Micro Electrochemical Machining at Micro to Meso-scale

Electrochemical machining (ECM) is an anodic dissolution process of metal as anode ion by ion, and micro-ECM is a promising micro machining method at micro to mesoscale. Thus, a micro-ECM setup was developed to fabricate micro parts and explore the feasibility of micro-ECM at micro to mesoscale, including the design of high-frequency micro-energy pulse power supply. By using the detection unit of machining state and optical encoder, a closed loop control system for micro-ECM was developed. Under low concentration of passivating electrolyte, low machining voltage and high-frequency short-pulse current, the machining gap can be reduced to about 10 mum. A deep micro-hole about 100 mum in diameter was drilled by edge-cut electrode on stainless steel with 750 mum thickness. The process of NC micro-EC milling is proposed, and microstructures with high-aspect ratio on stainless steel were fabricated by micro-EC milling, such as profiled micro-hole, micro spiral beam and micro array square columns