3. Electrochemical Cutting Process

Electrochemical machining process is an advanced cutting process that is based on Faraday law of electrolysis in which reverse electroplating process is used to achieve metal removal. It can be used to machine hard and difficult-to-machine materials. This important advanced machining process is described in this chapter. Development of new materials comes with lots of challenges in machining such materials because of the extreme properties of such materials that make it difficult to process these materials using the traditional manufacturing process. Electrochemical machining can be used to easily machine complex and intricate parts from these advanced materials and at mass production rate. Different types of electrochemical machining processes and processing parameters that influence the properties of material are presented. Advantages, disadvantages and areas of applications of electrochemical machining process are highlighted. Some of the research works in electrochemical machining process are also presented in this chapter.