Design and Development of Cartridge-Based Automated Fluid Delivery System for Ball End Magnetorheological Finishing Process

Ball end magnetorheological finishing (BEMRF) is a nanofinishing process, and the surface characteristic of the finished product plays a major role. In this process, the volume of polishing fluid affects the quality of the finished surface. Therefore, there arises a need for automated supply of precise and controlled volume of polishing fluid in BEMRF process. In the present work, a new fluid delivery system (FDS) is developed that supplies a precise amount of material-specific polishing fluid to finish different materials under varying finishing parameters by automated delivery of fluid stored in cylindrical-shaped cartridge. Apart from this, since the composition of the polishing fluid is material-specific, it requires continuous change of polishing fluid for finishing of different materials. This becomes extremely expensive and time-consuming with the existing system of polishing fluid being mixed in a large stirrer tank and supplied to the tool tip via a peristaltic pump. The cartridge-based FDS helps in addressing these issues by allowing economical and quick change of material-specific polishing fluid composition. The new FDS is also equipped with radio frequency identification (RFID) technique which verifies the material-specific fluid and only then supplies the fluid for finishing application.