High-speed edge trimming of carbon fiber-reinforced polymer composites using coated router tools

During trimming of edges of carbon fiber-reinforced polymer composite parts, issues such as resin degradation, delamination, and poor surface finish at the trimmed edges, and increased tool wear in cutting tools used is common. Therefore, it is essential to carry out investigations on edge trimming of carbon fiber-reinforced polymer to find the effect of cutting forces generated and the cutting tool temperature induced at different high speeds and feeds conditions. In this work, two different-coated router tools of titanium aluminum nitride-coated and diamond-like carbon-coated routers were used for investigating the effect of these coatings on cutting force and cutting tool temperature which affect the surface quality of trimmed carbon fiber-reinforced polymer. From the investigation, it was found that the diamond-like carbon-coated router tool has generated lower cutting forces, cutting tool temperatures, and, in turn, better surface finish even at high-speed conditions when compared to other tools. Due to the complex geometry of the router tool, online tool wear monitoring by acoustic emission technique was employed. Acoustic emission signals were taken as the measuring index of tool wear which shows good correlation with direct tool wear measurements. From the experiments, it was found that the tool performance of the diamond-like carbon-coated router is superior when compared to other tools. In addition, for edge trimming of carbon fiber-reinforced polymer composite parts, the diamond-like carbon router tool performed without much disturbance for a length of machining of around 5.9 m which is about 46% of increase in length of machining when compared to uncoated router tool.