Author : Maan Aabid Tawfiq and Saad Hameed Najem

AISI 304 stainless steel have a wide range of applications in the industrial field. The need for machining AISI 304 SS has not been eliminated fully. Productivity is one of the important machining characteristics of electrical discharge machining (EDM) and it is expressed as the material removal rate (MRR). In this investigation an attempt has been made to assess the influences of machining parameters on the machining of AISI 304 SS. Design of experiments (full factorial design) concept has been used for experimentation. The machining experiments were conducted on a die sinking EDM machine using copper electrode tool with two levels of factors. The factors considered were electrode shape, pulse current, pulse on time and pulse off time. A procedure has been developed to assess and optimize the chosen factors to attain maximum MRR by incorporating: (i) response table and response graph; (ii) normal probability plot; (iii) interaction graphs; (iv) analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique. The results indicated that electrode shape is a factor, which has greater influence on MRR, followed by pulse off time. Also the determined optimal conditions really increase the MRR on the machining of AISI 304 SS within the ranges of parameters studied.

Keywords: EDM; AISI 304 SS; MRR; Response table; Response graph; ANOVA; Normal Probability Plot.

Article published in International Journal of Current  Engineering  and Technology, Vol.4,No.4 (Aug- 2014)