Experimental Evaluation of Surface Roughness in Orthogonal Micro-Milling Processes
Surface roughness plays a critical role in evaluating and measuring the surface quality of a machined product. Two workpiece materials have been investigated by experimental approach in order to gain a better understanding of their influence on the obtained surface roughness in the micro-milling processes. The experimental results show that: surface topography is completely different for different materials at the same cutting speed and feed rate; surface roughness increases with an increase of material grain size. Surface roughness decreases to a lowest value, and then increases with an increase of the feed rate. A new surface model to illustrate the influence of material and uncut chip thickness was developed. The model has been experimentally validated and shows more promising results than Weule’s model.