The study on surface quality and tool wear on laser-assisted micromachining of β21s titanium alloy

An experimental study was conducted on laser-assisted machining of β21s titanium alloy to investigate the effects of input variables of laser-assisted micromachining (LAMM) and conventional micromachining (CM) on the surface quality of β21s titanium alloy. At the same time, the tool wear patterns of LAMM and CM were revealed, and the wear law of the tools under different laser parameters when cutting different distances was studied as well. The experimental results showed that an optimum roughness value of 0.132 μm was obtained at a laser power of 30 W, a cutting speed of 100 mm/s, and a cutting depth of 10 μm, reduced by 61.7% as compared to CM. On the other hand, during the LAMM and CM experiments, the flank wear of the tools was characterized by bonding wear, while the degree of tool wear was effectively reduced in LAMM. Meanwhile, the influence of cutting length and laser power on tool wear is obtained under the condition of constant cutting speed and cutting depth. In addition, in the process of LAMM, as the cutting length increases and other processing parameters remain unchanged, the optimal laser power is not constant. Increasing the laser power appropriately can effectively suppress tool wear.