Numerical simulation of tool wear in drilling Inconel 718 under flood and cryogenic cooling conditions

This paper aims to model and simulate tool wear in drilling of Inconel 718 under two different cooling conditions, using an innovative numerical procedure. Although tool wear models can be implemented in most of finite element analysis (FEA) software to calculate the tool wear rate, there is a great limit due to the inability of all these software to update the geometry of the worn tool. In order to overcome this limitation, a subroutine able to modify the tool geometry based on a given tool wear model was developed and implemented in DEFORM 3D, an implicit FEA software. Experimental tests were performed to measure tool wear in drilling using conventional metal working fluids (MWF) and liquid nitrogen (LN2) cooling. Experimental data were used to calibrate the tool wear model and to validate the drilling models. A comparison between simulated and measured results demonstrated the suitability of the developed drilling model to predict tool wear under both MWF and LN2 cooling conditions. Therefore, the developed model can be efficiently used to evaluate the influence of the cutting conditions (including cooling conditions) on tool wear, minimizing the number of expensive and time-consuming tool wear tests.