Experimental investigation of material removal mechanism in single grit grinding

This paper presents an important investigation of material removal behaviour during single grit grinding, which provides critical insight of grinding mechanics for improving grinding efficiency and quality. During the investigation, CBN grits were used to perform scratch tests on En24T steel. Piles up ratio, chip removal strength, effective grit engage radius are introduced to measure material removal performance. It has been discovered that grit cutting edge shape has significant influence on ploughing and cutting actions. By comparing scratch tests using grits with single edge or multiple edges, it has demonstrated that cutting is more efficient with single edge grit. More ploughing actions appear in multiple edges scratches. Furthermore, material removal mechanism along a single scratch is investigated and found that material removal is more prominent at the grit entrance side of the scratch compared to the grit exit side of the scratch. The research findings provide critical information for grinding optimization. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.