Experimental Validation for Energy Consumption in Conventional Machining of Al alloy

Abstract

Machine tools are accountable for environmental influence owing to their energy consumption. It is also a challenge for modern manufacturing how to reduce the environmental impacts related to machining processes. The environmental studies about machine tool that used in machining reveals that more than 99% of environmental impacts are due to the consumption of electrical energy. This paper presents the experimental validation of energy consumption at conventional machining of Aluminum alloy Al 6061-T6. In literature, most energy consumption was analyzed at low machining speed (in the ranges of 500 m/min), whereas in this study analyze the energy consumption and surface roughness in the machining of Al alloy 6061-T6 at conventional machining range (up to 750m/min). Design of experiments were done with the help of Taguchi L9 orthogonal array. The set of experiments were performed on two different machine tools using single point cutting methodology. Aluminum alloy 6061-T6 used as a work-piece material and it is widely used materials in automobiles, aerospace, defence and bio-medical industries. All these experiments were performed by using fresh cutting inserts, that’s why the effect of tool wear was not considered for power and energy measurements. The main purpose of this research is to validate the benchmark results and acquire the minimum value of energy consumption and surface roughness while maximizing the material removal rate of the process. The experimental results were analyzed with the help of ANOVA and main effects plots. During ANOVA analysis, feed rate was most significant factor for minimizing the SCE consumption and surface roughness. In main effect plots, the minimum value of specific cutting energy was obtained at highest level of feed rate, depth of cut and cutting speed.