Dry cutting can not only protect the environment, but also reduce the processing costs. It can consciously reduce or completely stop using cutting fluid methods in machining, make economic and social benefits to optimally coordinated development.
At the beginning of the 1990s, dry cutting technology abroad a number of studies, and applied to the actual production, has achieved a certain social and economic benefits, and has become a trend in the development of metal-cutting machining.
In the metal cutting process, the manufacturer often use cutting fluid which main effect is to lower the cutting temperature, improve the friction state and wear state in machining process, and thus improve the surface quality of the work piece, extend the insert tool life.
With the machining industry rising cost of cutting fluid, as well as environment protection and energy requirements, dry cutting has been used for both hard materials cutting and small parts cutting. With Halnn BN-K20 welded pcbn inserts and BN-S30 solid cbn inserts for processing cast iron, dry cutting tools grade enter the market, the current dry cutting technology is also widely used for common gray cast iron and pearlite nodular cast iron.
According to statistics, in the total cost of Machinery manufacturing, cutting fluid accounted for the proportion of the production costs up to 15%, while the tool costs account for only 3-5% of production costs. In the past, the costs of changing wet cutting to dry cutting are very high, but with the development of tool materials, it is not a problem. In fact, dry cutting and high-speed turning is not only feasible, but also profitable. The trick is correctly integrated cutting tools, machine tools and cutting technology. Improving cutting tool material to achieve dry cutting is the most direct and economical method. In order to achieve dry cutting, the biggest technical challenge is the cutting tool which need to have a high temperature red hardness, chemical stability and low coefficient of friction.
In the manufacturing industry, traditional thought think that achieve high cutting speed and cut hard materials must use the cutting fluid. While the reality for many processing is that cutting fluid is still necessary, but studies have shown that with modern cutting tool materials cubic boron nitride doesn’t need the cutting fluid. The reason is that cutting zone temperature becomes very high, usually exceeding 1000℃, especially in high-speed cutting and hard material cutting. For example, assume that cutting fluid can overcome the centrifugal force generated by milling cutter high speed rotating. Cutting fluid before reaching the cutting zone already vaporized, almost no cooling effect.
Dry cutting tool material development for common cast iron parts is Halnn tools BN-S30 and BN-K20 PCBN inserts.Currently, BN-K20 pcbn inserts and BN-S30 solid cbn insert are used for processing cast iron brake discs, brake drums, gearbox housing, engine block and cast iron flywheel, pressure plate in high-speed dry cutting. Since the cutting tool material at 1,300℃ has normal cutting high temperature red hardness and chemical stability, turning gray cast iron and pearlite ductile iron parts, cutting speed can up to 500m/min or more. It also can be used for machining center with 1000m/min linear speed or more high-speed milling gray cast iron parts.
Grey cast iron are the main raw material in automotive manufacturing industry, which is used for making a variety of parts, including the engine block, cylinder heads, differential housing, shafts, flywheels, brake drums and brake discs and so on.
Halnn tools in gray cast iron machining applications undoubtedly is the most successful, especially BN-K20 brazed pcbn inserts for fine finishing and BN-S30 solid cbn inserts for large margin greatly improved the cutting efficiency and totally reduce the production costs.