Investigation on the Effect of Variation in Cutting Speeds and Angle of Cut During Slant Type Taper Cutting in WEDM of Hastelloy X

Nickel-based superalloys are classified under difficult to machine materials due to its higher affinity to tool materials and low thermal diffusivity. Wire electric discharge machining (WEDM) is a spark eroding technique for precise machining of such superalloys with complex machining geometries. Tapering in WEDM has many disadvantages like wire break, angular inaccuracies and dielectric distribution for better surfaces. In this paper, a unique method was developed and employed to achieve taper surface by tilting the workpiece using a slant type taper fixture for machining of tapered surfaces. Different aspects like cutting thickness, surface roughness, slant angle, surface crack density and width of cut were examined for five distinct cutting speed parameters at different angles, namely 0°, 15°, 30°, 45° and 60°. In the present research work, Hastelloy X was machined using zinc-coated copper wire and cutting speed was ranged between 0.16 and 2.49 mm/min. The slant angle was observed to be independent of cutting speed, and it was influenced by wire vibration, manufacturing imprecisions of slant fixture. It was found that as the cutting speed increases, surface crack density and surface roughness also increase. It was observed that both the parameters increased with the increase in the angle of cut from 0° to 60° although the cutting speed decreased.