Investigation into Different Tool Coating performance While Turning Al6061

Cutting tool material technology in recent years has made great strides with substantial improvements in their strength, toughness, and wears resistance, which are designed to increase productivity, improve tool selection and aid to decrease costs and promote machining quality. This investigation presents the effect of various cutting speeds in turning of Al6061 with respect to different coatings.

Experiments carried out under orthogonal dry cutting, and two different cutting speeds applied which were 250, 500 m/min. Feed rate and depth of cut kept constant respectively at 0.05 mm/rev and 0.5 mm in experiments. Three different carbide cutting tools have been used namely CVD tri-phase multilayer TiC/TiCN/TiN coated, PVD TiN coated and CVD TiC/Al2O3 coated.

Tool performance was determined with respect to tool wear and surface finish in tests. Results obtained that tri-phase coated illustrated longest tool life, however best surface finish achieved by TiN coated tool. In addition adhered material which mainly formed in CVD tri-phase TiC/TiCN/TiN and TiC/Al2O3 coated tools, at higher cutting speed deteriorated surface finish in comparison to lower cutting speed.