Wear behavior of diamond wheel for grinding optical connector ferrule - FEA and wear test -

The grinding characteristics and the wear behavior of diamond wheel for grinding the optical connector ferrule were investigated by finite element analysis (FEA) and wear test. FEA of contact between diamond wheel and ferrule shows that the subsurface damage area of ferrule is 13μm from the interface of abrasive particle and matrix. Fallout of abrasive particle is affected by the stress state at the interface. A 2-D finite element model was established to calculate the distribution of stress at the interface. As the result of FEA, fallout condition of abrasive was concerned with the ratio of the critical protrusion; the ratio of particle size is about 0.6. FE model was established to investigate the effects of the diamond concentration of wheel. The FEA result shows that the lower concentration of it has larger wear volume due to the small stress propagation. To investigate grinding performance, the pin-on-disc wear test was carried out for three types of concentrations 75%, 100% and 125%. Through the wear test, it was confirmed that the 75% wheel concentration has the highest amount of wear volume. This result shows good agreement with that of FEA. And 100% concentration by considering the grinding ratio of the wheel shows the best optimized result for the grinding performance