On the tribology and grinding performance of graphene-modified porous composite-bonded CBN wheel

In order to provide the effective reinforcement and lubrication for reducing the friction on the interface of the grinding wheel and workpiece during the high-efficiency deep grinding of difficult-to-machine materials, an in-house developed porous composite-bonded (Cubic Boron Nitride) CBN wheel with graphene nanoplatelets was explored to meet the increasing demand for industrial purpose. It can be found from experimental study that by adding the appropriate concentration of graphene, 0.01 wt%, both of the flexural strength and tribology performance have been enhanced in the graphene-modified porous composite-bonded CBN wheel, and then the related grinding wheel was fabricated to perform the grinding experiments on the Ti–6Al–4V titanium alloy (TC4). It has been found that by adding the graphene the sharpness of the abrasives on the surface of the grinding wheel always keeps at a certain range and the grinding wheel may have self-sharpening ability which can guarantee the stability during the high-efficiency deep grinding process. Finally, by considering process parameters in this study the graphene-modified porous composite-bonded CBN grinding wheel could be used to achieve the high-efficiency deep grinding of TC4 as well as guarantee its surface quality under the grinding wheel speed of 80 m/s, grinding depth of 0.1 mm and workpiece feed speed of 0.6 m/min.