Simulation of Electrolyte Flow Pattern and Variation of MRR With Machining Variables in ECM for L-shaped Tool using CFD

Abstract

Electrochemical machining is one of the non-traditional machining processes. This is based on the principle of Faraday’s laws of electrolysis. ECM is very much helpful in machining complex and complicated shapes and difficult to cut materials. One of the main advantages of ECM over other machining process is negligible tool wear as there is no direct contact between tool and workpiece. But sometimes because of inappropriate design of complicated shaped tools there are chances of passivation and overheating of electrolyte which further leads to poor machining. So the analysis of this flow pattern is very much necessary to counteract this overheating tendency of the electrolyte. This research work is mainly to study the flow pattern by determining the variation in pressure pattern, temperature pattern, velocity pattern, turbulent kinetic energy pattern, and the current density distribution from the brine groove inlet to the outer wall.
Simulation of this CFD problem is done by ANSYS-CFX 15.0 and FLUENT software. Two phase flow analysis of the electrolyte is done in this simulation. Geometrical modelling is done by ansys design modeler in which workpiece is taken as circular in shape with 60 mm diameter 20 mm height made with iron, electrolyte is taken as 20% brine solution and tool is taken as L-shaped copper tool. Material removal rate (MRR) of this model is calculated by varying the electrolyte flow velocity, inter electrode gap (IEG), feed rate and applied voltage.
The result shows that material removal rate (MRR) increases with an increase in flow velocity, concentration of electrolyte, feed rate, applied voltage and reduction in inter electrode gap (IEG)