Chatter Behavior in the Milling Process of Inconel 718: Effects of Tool Edge Radius

Abstract

Inconel 718 is widely used in various high end industries such as aerospace, nuclear plant, petrochemical plants etc. Inconel 718 is used for these applications due to unique mechanical properties such as high mechanical strength at elevated temperatures, high resistance to corrosion, and high strength to weight ratio. The unique properties of Inconel 718 made it difficult to be machined due to rapid work hardening and high cutting temperature. In addition, chatter vibration further increases the difficulty in machining of Inconel 718. In this paper, an experimental study on the effects of tool edge radius to the chatter behaviour was investigated. The dynamic responses of the milling process were recorded and analysed in both time domain and frequency domain. The results showed the variable helix and pitch end mill tool with larger tool edge radius able to mitigate chatter vibration at lower cutting speeds. Variable helix and pitch end mill with specific tool edge radius able to mitigate chatter vibration under the same cutting parameters. Experiments shows proper selection of tool edge radius improves the stability of end milling machining process.