Nowadays the use of high-strength carbon fiber reinforced plastics (CFRP) composite as a material for many engineering applications is becoming of increasing demand by the industry. These composites are replacing the traditional use of steel because they offer many advantages such as very light weight, high strength, high stiffness associated with good corrosion. Unfortunately there is little technological knowledge on the electrical discharge machining (EDM) process of high-strength composite materials, especially about the CFRP. In this work, a study has been made into the possibility of using the EDM process as a means of machining CFRP composite. Various cutting conditions such as peak current, pulse-on time, pulse-off time and open-circuit voltage were selected to perform electrical discharge machining. The effect of electrode rotation was also studied. Optimum cutting conditions and machine settings for EDM were chosen for machining CFRP composite. |
