A First Step towards a Tribological Approach to Investigate Cutting Tool Wear

The present work is motivated by the will to improve Finite Element (FE) Modelling of cutting tool wear. As a first step, the characterisation of wear mechanisms and identification of a wear model appear to be fundamental. The key idea of this work consists in using a dedicated tribometer, able to simulate relevant tribological conditions encountered in cutting (pressure, velocity). The tribometer can be used to estimate the evolution of wear versus time for various tribological conditions (pressure, velocity, temperature). Based on this design of experiments, it becomes possible to identify analytically a wear model. As a preliminary study this paper will be focused on the impact of sliding speed at the contact interface between 304L stainless steel and tungsten carbide (WC) coated with titanium nitride (TiN) pin. This experiment enables to observe a modification of wear phenomena between sliding speeds of 60 m/min and 180 m/min. Finally, the impact on macroscopic parameters has been observed.