Metaheuristic approach in machinability evaluation of silicon carbide particle/glass fiber-reinforced polymer matrix composites during electrochemical discharge machining process

The advanced manufacturing and machining techniques are adopting a population-based metaheuristic algorithm for production, predicting and decision-making. Using the same approach, this paper deals with the application of bees algorithm and differential evolution to forecast the optimal parametric values aiming to obtain maximum material removal rate during electrochemical discharge machining of silicon carbide particle/glass fiber-reinforced polymer matrix composite. The bees algorithm follows swarm-based approach, while differential evolution works on a population-based approach. The experimental design was prepared on the basis of Taguchi's methodology using an L-16 orthogonal array. For the experimental analysis, the main variables in the process, that is, electrolyte concentration (g/L), inter-electrode gap (mm), duty factor and voltage (volts), were selected as main input parameters, and material removal rate (mg/min) was adjudged as output quality characteristic. A comparative investigation reveals that the maximum material removal rate was obtained by the parametric value proposed by differential evolution that follows the bees algorithm and Taguchi's methodology. Furthermore, the results prove that the differential evolution algorithm has better collective assessment capability with a rapid converging rate.