Investigation of the effect of wheel grooves on surface grinding performance in EN18 Steel

Abstract The grooved grinding wheels are utilized to enhance the coolant supply to the grinding zone and reduce the heat throughout grinding, thus making the grinding performance more efficient. In the present study, Al2O3 grinding wheels of axial, circumferential and helical grooved wheels were used to grind the EN18 steel. The input parameters chosen for experiments were types of grooved grinding wheels, depth of cut with three different coolant techniques (Dry, Flood and MQL) and experiments were conducted as per L9 Taguchi orthogonal matrix. Output parameters measured for each experiment were grinding ratio (GR), material removal rate (MRR), grinding efficiency (GE), surface roughness (Ra), specific energy (SE), temperature and noise during surface grinding. The grinding performance of non-grooved grinding wheels was compared with a grooved wheel. The results showed that using grooved grinding wheels increases all the grinding performances when compared to the non-grooved grinding wheel. The helical grooved wheel with MQL combinations reduced the temperature, sound, surface roughness and specific energy from 35.8 to 32.1 °C, 86.9 to 80.7 dB, 1.584 to 0.258 µm and 0.173 to 0.054 kJ/mm2 respectively. At the same time, the MRR, HRC, GR and GE were improved using grooved grinding wheels along with MQL from 0.432 to 1.37 mm3/s, 58.5 to 61.5 HRC, 1.77 to 4.567 and 10.26 to 43.9% respectively. Finally, the optimum grinding parameter combination was identified from a helical grooved wheel in all grinding performances. Finally, the performance of the helical grooved wheel was compared with non-grooved wheels. SEM images were taken to understand the surface finish and defects on the ground surfaces for the different wheels with coolants.