Title: An experimental investigation and modelling for travelling wire electrochemical machining of Monel 400 alloys

Authors: M. Kalaimathi; G. Venkatachalam; M. Sivakumar

Addresses: School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Vellore, 632014, Tamilnadu, India ' School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Vellore, 632014, Tamilnadu, India ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sree Sowdambika College of Engineering, Aruppukkottai, 626134, Tamilnadu, India

Abstract: Monel 400 alloys find its applications in aerospace and marine industries. It is tough to cut these alloys using conventional machine tools as the hardness is high and also these alloys work-harden during cutting. Travelling wire electrochemical machining (TWECM), can cut these alloys efficiently and improves material removal rate (MRR) and surface quality. In this investigation, an attempt was made to investigate the TWECM characteristics of Monel 400 alloys and model the equation for MRR with the three process parameters i.e. voltage (V), electrolyte concentration (EC) and travelling wire speed (TS). The response surface methodology (RSM) was employed for design and analysis of experiments. The contour plots were generated to understand the effect of machining parameters on MRR. Artificial neural networks (ANN) were implemented to predict the process parameters. The predicted values of MRR with regression equation and ANN are in close agreement with the experimental results.

Keywords: travelling wire electrochemical machining; TWECM; material removal rate; MRR; response surface methodology; RSM; artificial neural networks; ANN.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMTM.2020.107307

International Journal of Manufacturing Technology and Management, 2020 Vol.34 No.3, pp.259 - 281

Received: 09 Mar 2016
Accepted: 29 Jul 2016
Published online: 13 May 2020 *

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