Assessment of an experimental setup for high speed grinding using vitrified CBN wheels

This paper is concerned with the assessment of an experimental setup for grinding experiments with a top wheel speed of 250 m/s. Among other considerations, high speed grinding is widely considered as a way for enhancing material removal rates by utilising large depths of cut and/or high workspeeds. Performing high speed grinding operations, however, presents challenges to the setup due to the high wheel speeds involved. An experimental setup was established in this study for high speed grinding of hardened nodular cast iron and steel using vitrified CBN wheels. This setup was assessed prior to grinding for wheel balancing and guarding, wheel core expansion and temperature rise, grinding fluid delivery, and idle power consumptions. It was found that high speed wheel rotations caused wheel expansion and temperature rise. A significant portion of the total power was consumed on actions other than material removals. The preliminary grinding tests indicated that the setup met the requirements for high speed grinding in general. Copyright \ua9 2013 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.Peer reviewed: YesNRC publication: Ye