Machinability evaluations of austempered ductile iron and cast steel with similar mechanical properties under eco-friendly milling conditions

Abstract In engineering applications, to increase productivity and to decrease production costs, the selection of the proper engineering material is essential. At that point, machining operations directly affect the production costs. Therefore, determination of the material with the desired mechanical properties and easy-to-cut characteristics has a critical importance. This situation is currently gaining more importance in especially defense industry applications in which high strength engineering materials are heavily employed. In addition, tool performance and final product quality are directly influenced by the cooling and/or lubrication conditions in particularly interrupted cutting operations. In this study, machinability characteristics of G18NiMoCr3-6+QT1 cast steel (CS) and 1050-6 austempered ductile iron (ADI) with similar mechanical properties during milling operations were investigated. The tests were performed using TiAlN coated cemented carbide (WC-Co) end mills under dry, conventional cutting fluid (CCF), and minimum quantity lubrication (MQL) conditions. Under each condition, the variations of cutting forces, tool wear, average surface roughness (Ra), and subsurface microstructure and microhardness were analyzed for both materials and then compared to one another. Test results showed that 1050-6 ADI led to further tool wear in comparison to G18NiMoCr3-6+QT1 CS. According to obtained results, dry condition is more favorable than CCF and MQL conditions in terms of cutting forces, surface roughness, and tool wear for both types of material. In addition, examinations on subsurface microstructures showed that MQL conditions provided an effective cutting environment to maintain microstructural stability of workpiece materials.