Original Article

Proc IMechE Part C:

J Mechanical Engineering Science
A three-dimensional finite element 0(0) 1–12
! IMechE 2016

simulation approach to analyze material Reprints and permissions:

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removal in electrochemical DOI: 10.1177/0954406216636167

pic.sagepub.com

discharge machining

Mudimallana Goud and Apurbba Kumar Sharma

Abstract
Industrial applications of glass and ceramic materials have increased manifold due to their relatively low friction, high
compression strength, high temperature and wear resistance, and excellent chemical inertness, etc. In microelectro-
mechanical systems the use of glass, along with silicon and polymer, has become very popular. However, microfabrication
of glass is a difficult process. The electrochemical discharge machining is now often used as one of the chipless machining
solutions for these materials. The electrochemical discharge machining, however, is a complex process with multiple
controllable parameters and exhibits stochastic nature. The mechanism of material removal in the process is yet to be
understood well in spite of many theories. In this paper, an attempt has been made to develop a three-dimensional finite
element model for simulation of material removal in electrochemical discharge machining drilling in order to explore the
mechanism further and correlated the findings with the experimentally obtained values. The model outputs were
compared with experimental results available in literature. The computed results from the model show good agreement
with the trial results.

Keywords
Electrochemical discharge machining, finite element simulation, material removal rate, Gaussian heat generation, alumina,
Soda lime glass

Date received: 25 September 2015; accepted: 2 February 2016

Introduction
electrical discharge drilling of glass. Cook et al.2 in
The needs of advanced materials in applications like 1973 called this process as discharge machining of
aerospace, automobile, nuclear, etc. have been nonconductive materials. Basak and Ghosh3 reported
increasing due to the requirement of high strength, the study on critical voltage and current required to
high strength-to-weight ratio, high temperature, and initiate the discharge in ECDM. They compared the
wear resistance of materials. Further, present day theoretical model with experimental results on mater-
materials are expected to offer minimal resistance to ial removal and found similarities with reasonable
mechanical motion and flow of fluid in order to per- accuracy. Khairy and McGeough4 had compared
form effectively and efficiently. Such needs have given the material removal rate, dimensional accuracy,
a fillip to developing materials like metal matrix com- and surface integrity of ECDM, EDM, and ECM
posites, ceramics, fiber-reinforced plastics, and so on. processes and found that results of ECDM were con-
Precession machining of these materials with conven- siderably better than the other two. Cao et al.5
tional machining processes is, however, challenging. demonstrated the potentials of ECDM for microma-
Hybrid nonconventional machining processes have chining of glass by fabricating three-dimensional (3D)
become popular due to their effective combination microstructures of around 80 mm in size. Jawalkar6
of two or more than two processes to overcome
the limitations of the individual processes. Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department, Indian Institute of
Electrochemical discharge machining (ECDM) is Technology Roorkee, Roorkee, India
one such process, which is frequently used for machin-
Corresponding author:
ing of nonconductive materials, which are otherwise
Apurbba Kumar Sharma, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering
difficult to machine. Department, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee 247667,
The first publication on ECDM was published by India.
Kurafuji and Suda1 in 1968, and they termed it as Emails: [email protected], [email protected]

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2 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

studied material removal rate (MRR) of soda lime 3D finite element transient thermal model for travel-
glass, optical glass, and borosilicate glass using ing wire electrochemical spark machining (TW-
NaCl and NaOH electrolytes. Similar studies on ECSM) to estimate the field of temperature in the
MRR of soda lime glass were reported by other workpiece. The MRR was calculated using the field
authors with different experimental conditions.7–12 of temperature. The MRR obtained using the model
Yang et al.13 reported the enhancement in MRR by was found to be more than the experimentally
adding SiC abrasive to electrolyte while machining obtained MRR. The reason for that could be due to
pyrex glass. Machining of metal matrix composites fact that 100% ejection efficiency was assumed in the
with water-based emulsion added to NaOH electro- model. Krötz et al.21 studied the heat-affected zone for
lyte was reported by Liu et al.14 with maximum MRR a single discharge of electrochemical arc machining by
of 49 mm3/min. In case of borosilicate glass, the max- developing a 2D model to simulate the heat transfer
imum MRR of 5.6 mg/min was reported by Gautam into the workpiece. The simulation showed that the
and Jain.15 diameter of the heat-affected zone was less dependent
The literature, in the area show that the ECDM on discharge duration and heat transfer due to heat
process is yet to be matured to be adopted by the flux. The simulation had also shown that the diameter
industry owing to incomplete information on many of the melting zone was almost equal to the diameter of
aspects of this process. Only few reports are available the arc spot. Thus, a single 3D model that could rea-
in literature related to theoretical determination of sonably explain the mechanism of material removal
MRR. Jain et al.16 analyzed MRR, depth of cut, during ECDM has not yet been found.
and overcut in ECDM by considering the process as
3D unsteady-state problem using finite element ana-
lysis technique. They assumed the occurrence of spark Mathematical modeling
in a prismatic column with square cross section, but
The principles of operation
ignored the effect of electrolyte concentration. An
analytical model of MRR with experimental valid- Figure 1 shows the schematic diagram of ECDM pro-
ation was reported by Basak et al.,17 but their spark cess, the workpiece is dipped in an electrolyte like
generation theory hardly matches the actual situation. KOH or NaOH. The tip of the tool electrode is
Bhondwe et al.18 have developed a thermal model for dipped inside the electrolyte by few millimeters and
MRR during ECSM (they termed it as electrochem- counter electrode of larger size (about a factor of hun-
ical spark machining). They estimated the MRR by dred) is placed few tens of millimeters (centimeters)
processing nodal temperatures with the finite element inside the electrolyte. When a pulsed voltage or DC
method (FEM) and had found that the model pro- power is supplied between electrodes, electrolysis
vided values within a reasonable range of accuracy occurs at low voltages that result in formation of
while compared with the experimental results. Wei hydrogen bubbles at tool electrode and oxygen bub-
et al.19 presented an FEM-based model for ECDM bles at the counter electrode. The bubble formation
drilling by simulating the process for removal of increases with the increase in the applied voltage.
material subject to a single spark. The results of the Beyond a critical voltage, the formation of gas film
model were reported to be in good agreement with the takes place around the tool electrode due to coales-
experimental results. Panda and Yadav20 developed a cence of the bubbles. The gas film isolates the tool

Figure 1. Schematic diagram of electrochemical discharge machining.

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Goud and Kumar Sharma 3

from the electrolyte and builds sufficient electric resist- 8. Material removal by cavitation effect and depos-
ance to generate the electrical discharge. If the work- ition due to recast layer on the machined surface
piece is placed near the vicinity of the discharge zone, were ignored.
machining does take place in the form of thermal ero-
sion and chemical etching. A finite element model (Figure 2) was developed to
In the present work, a 3D finite element model has analyze material removal caused by one spark, which
been developed to determine the temperature field causes heat input to the workpiece. The workpiece
developed due to heat generated by a spark that was modeled in 3D with a dimension of
leads to MRR. Distribution of heat within the spark 0.6  0.6  0.4 mm3. A bell-shaped part (its base
was assumed as 2D Gaussian (Figure 1, inset). radius equal to spark radius and other dimensions
Further, the temperature plots in the zone of influence are proportional to the 2D Gaussian function) was
of single spark and number of sparks per unit time considered glued on the top surface of the workpiece.
were used to estimate MRR. Results of the developed This bell-shaped part was assumed to be representing
model were compared with experimentally obtained the shape of a spark. Boundaries b1, b2, b3, b4, and b5
values as reported by other authors.17,18,26 were considered insulated thermally since heat trans-
fer cannot occur across these boundaries because the
thermal conductivity of glass is too low and spark
The assumptions duration is also too short. The area bg covered by
The following assumptions were made with respect to the bottom of the spark on the top surface of the
the ECDM process in order to simplify the model and workpiece, receives heat from the spark. The remain-
are commonly used by various authors: ing portion of the top surface (i.e. b6  bg) was con-
sidered to be thermally insulated similar to other
1. The properties of workpiece material are isotropic boundaries.
and homogeneous. The bell-shaped part representing the nature of
2. For each discharge, only one spark is produced at spark heat generation was constructed using 2D
the tip of the tool. Gaussian function. In 2D consideration, the power
3. Shape of the heat distribution is identical for all to which ‘‘e’’ is raised in the Gaussian function is
sparks and is assumed to be 2D Gaussian distributed. any negative-definite quadratic form. A particular
4. A fraction of total heat of sparking was dissipated example of a 2D Gaussian function22 is
into the workpiece as the heat zone is surrounded ( !)
by electrolyte. ðx  xo Þ2 ðy  yo Þ2
5. Duration of each spark was assumed to be fðx, yÞ ¼ A exp  þ ð1Þ
2x2 2y2
identical.
6. Assumed ejection efficiency is of 100%.
7. Tool wear, drop in electrolyte level due to evapor- where A is the amplitude coefficient; (xo, yo) are the x
ation of water, and chemical consumption were and y coordinates of the spark center, and ( x,  y) are
neglected. the x and y spreads of the bell curve.

Figure 2. Geometrical model with boundary conditions.

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4 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

A Gaussian curve with a 2D domain created using Each trial model was simulated for the same set of
A ¼ 1, xo ¼ 0, yo ¼ 0,  x ¼  y ¼ 1 is shown in Figure 3. working conditions. The temperatures at the center of
spark on top surface of the workpiece were compared
with the temperatures reported by Bhondwe et al.18 The
Formulation of the spark region
temperature 17071.1 K (Table 1) was resulted from the
The spark region was constructed using the bell curve, fifth model of spark height 0.17 mm and was found to
also called as Gaussian distribution curve (Figures 1 be nearer to the temperature (around 17,000 K) as given
and 4). The bottom radius of the bell curve was taken by Bhondwe et al.18 Hence, the spark height was taken
as the spark radius while the height of the curve was as 0.17 mm for further analyses.
derived by a trial-and-error method. Five models were The following 3D heat diffusion general equation
constructed with different curve heights (0.05, 0.1, 0.15, was used to find out the temperature distribution
0.18, and 0.17 mm) to find out the suitable curve height. (required for estimation of MRR) within the work-
piece of homogeneous and isotropic
 
@2 T @2 T @2 T @T
k þ þ ¼ Cp ð2Þ
@X2 @Y2 @Z2 @t

where , Cp, k, T, and t (parameters related to work-

piece) are density, specific heat, thermal conductivity,
temperature, and time respectively and X, Y, and Z
coordinate axes (Figure 2).

Boundary conditions
As the workpiece is immersed in the electrolyte before
the start of the process, the temperature of the whole
domain ABCDEFGH was assumed to be at room
temperature (To). Hence, T ¼ To in the workpiece
domain at t ¼ 0.
Figure 3. Gaussian curve with a two-dimensional domain.22 Boundaries b1, b2, b3, b4, and b5 were considered to
be insulated as the temperature gradient across these
boundaries is very less when compared to incoming
heat boundary bg and is almost negligible. On the
boundary b6, the total heat qg, produced by the spark
was passed to workpiece through the area of bg. Thus,
@T
@n ¼ 0, on boundaries b1, b2, b3, b4, b5 and (b6  bg) at
t 5 0, where n is normal to the boundary.
In the present work, a Gaussian heat generation
distribution was used and, accordingly, the heat gen-
eration calculation expression qg is derived as

  4:45Ep VI
qg rx , ry ¼
Volume of spark region

     ð3Þ
rx 2 ry 2
Figure 4. Single spark energy distribution zone as considered exp 4:5 þ
R R
in the present study.

Table 1. Temperature output at the center of spark on top surface of the workpiece obtained for different heights of the bell curve.

Temperature at
Trial Height of the Volume of the Heat generation center of spark on
model bell curve (mm) bell curve (mm3) (W/mm3) top surface of workpiece (K)

1 0.05 0.001218058 35,265.30 38,610.8

2 0.1 0.002436117 17,632.65 27,761.7
3 0.15 0.003654175 11,755.10 19,313.2
4 0.18 0.00438501 9795.91 16,663.3
5 0.17 0.004141398 10,372.14 17,071.1

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Goud and Kumar Sharma 5

where rx and ry are the radial distances from the axis the material removed by one spark and total
of the spark along X and Y directions; V is voltage number of sparks per unit time; this assumption is
applied; I is machining current; Ep is energy partition; based on the work of Bhondwe et al.18 It was also
and R is the spark radius. assumed that the discharge occurs only at the tip of
The machining current I is the function of the elec- the tool and only one spark is generated at a time, and
trolyte concentration, and their relationship was sparks occur consecutively at the same location.
derived from the critical current versus concentration In ECDM, the material removal is related to tem-
of electrolyte characteristics given by Basak and perature rise in the workpiece due to spark. Therefore,
Ghosh.3 The following mathematical relationships the material removal criterion can be taken as
between current and electrolyte concentration were
obtained by curve fitting method using a standard T 4 Tm ð6Þ
statistical tool (MS-EXCEL software, version 2010).
For NaOH This criterion says that the workpiece material where
the temperature is higher than Tm (melting tempera-
I ¼ 3:2323  105 C3  0:0027056C2 ture) is considered removed by melting.
ð4Þ The isotherm planes for melting temperature are
þ 0:091378C þ 0:71429
plotted for one spark to find out the volume sur-
For KOH rounded by them that determines the amount of mater-
ial removed by melting. This volume can be determined
I ¼ 3  106  C3  0:0007  C2 using the mathematical expression given as18
ð5Þ
þ 0:0562  C þ 0:4424 ZZZ
2 2
Vm ¼ ðr0 , z0 , Þdr dz d ¼ r z0 ð7Þ
where C is the electrolyte concentration in wt%. 3 0
So far, no comprehensive approach has been pro-
posed to find the value of Ep. A detailed analysis of where Vm is the volume of material obtained for one
electrical energy supplied to the process was reported spark, and r0 and z0 are the coordinate axes intercept-
by Kulkarni et al.,23 which shows that about 77–96% ing the isotherms as illustrated in Figure 5(a).
of total energy is utilized by the electrolyte that raises The total volume of material per unit time (VT) is
its temperature. Only about 2–6% of the total energy calculated as
is transferred to the workpiece that raises its localized
temperature and helps in evaporating the workpiece VT ¼ Vm  number of sparks per unit time:
material. The remaining energy gets dissipated in
heating the tool and in creating shock waves in the Then the MRR can be calculated by
electrolyte. Based on this analysis, the value for Ep has
been taken as 5%. MRR ¼ VT  
The spark diameter was taken as 300 mm, which is
based on experimental results reported by Kulkarni where  is the density of the workpiece material.
et al.24 Wüthrich and Fascio25 had reported that the It is interesting to note the approximate matching
duration of spark is in an order of 100 s when a of the curvature shapes produced by sparks due to
constant DC power is applied. Therefore, the constant material erosion during the experimental investiga-
value of 100 s was used as the spark duration in this tion. It is a fact that creating a single spark in an
model. experimental setup is practically challenging.
Determination of the volumetric shape of the
removed material due to single spark is thus difficult
Estimation of MRR
to obtain. However, Figure 5(b) and (c) shows some
In ECDM, the material removal is primarily caused scanning electron micrographs (SEMs) revealing the
due to melting and ablation when the discharge takes shape impression of a typical spark. The impressions
place across the hydrogen gas film generated in the were created due to the material erosion while drilling
reaction of electrolysis. Actually, the gas film gener- blind holes on soda lime glass using a homebuilt
ation is a complex phenomenon and is based on the ECDM setup. The setup was developed by the present
process of randomly generated hydrogen bubbles. authors (Figure 6(a)). Soda lime glass and quartz
However, the analysis of hydrogen gas film becomes glasses were machined (drilling and channel machin-
challenging because of the problem of locating the ing: Figure 6(b) to (d)) in the setup using KOH and
nucleation site of the hydrogen bubbles over the NaOH electrolytes. Material erosion during multiple
tool surface, and it is a highly stochastic process. (continued) sparks causes machining (a hole or chan-
Thus, the material removal calculation is usually car- nel depending on the design). The curvatures obtained
ried out for single spark to simplify the situation. on the top surface (mostly due to a few stray sparks)
Assuming that the distribution of energy is equal as seen indicated by the arrows in Figure 5(b) and (c)
among the sparks, the MRR can be calculated as resembles the shape assumed in the above model

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6 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

Figure 5. (a) Schematic of the volume of crater due to single spark; images of curvatures due to material erosion while drilling on
soda lime glass with Ø 450 mm cylindrical tool at: (b) 50 V, KOH 25 wt%; (c) 50 V, KOH 30 wt%; (d) and (e) approximate measures of
the curvatures created by sparks.

(Figure 5(a)). On further, examination, it was found for two different materials, alumina and soda lime
that the radii of these curvatures, as marked in Figure glass. The finite element simulation process consists
5(d) and (e), were around the values assumed of three main steps—preprocessing, solution, and
(300 mm). The observed diameters of craters created post processing. In the preprocessing, workpiece size
by single spark are in reasonably acceptable range as was 0.6  0.6  0.4 mm3. It was discretized with
compared to the findings reported by Kulkarni et al.24 eight-noded SOLID70 elements and the spark region
They studied the effect of a single spark on the work- with MASS71 (point) elements having one degree of
piece under optical microscope and observed the sig- freedom. A sectional view of the discretized model is
nature of individual discharges striking the surface, shown in Figure 7. In the present simulation, it was
spark size, and their distribution over the surface. assumed that the spark region is filled with hydrogen
The discharge-affected region was seen as a circular gas since the hydrogen gas is produced in ECDM pro-
zone. Based on these observations, Bhondwe et al.18 cess due to chemical reaction during electrolysis. The
had simulated 2D finite element model. The present properties of soda lime glass, alumina, and hydrogen
3D simulation was also based on the same gas are listed in Table 2. In the solution, the model was
observations. solved for temperature at each node by the ANSYS
solver. In the post-processing phase, the temperature
fields were plotted, and an isotherm of Tm was gener-
Results and discussions
ated to obtain the intercepts of the isotherm at coord-
In order to predict the removal of material by one inate axes. Figure 8 shows an isometric view of the
spark, a transient heat transfer simulation model with temperature field plotted for one spark.
various boundary conditions was simulated using After knowing the temperature distribution, nodal
ANSYS 14.0. The study on MRR was carried out temperature isotherms were plotted for the

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Goud and Kumar Sharma 7

Figure 6. (a) Photograph of the homebuilt ECDM setup; a few typical ECDM output of the above setup: (b) blind hole on soda lime
glass; (c) blind hole on quartz glass; and (d) channel on quartz glass.

distribution showed that the highest temperature

registered at the point where the spark strikes the
top surface and decreases with the increase in the dis-
tance from that point.
The temperature distribution along the radial dis-
tance and along the depth was compared with simu-
lation results taken from Bhondwe et al.18 for soda
lime glass. The results of the present 3D FEM simu-
lation model is matching well (within an acceptable
error) with simulation results of the 2D simulation
reported by Bhondwe et al.18 The errors in both the
cases (towards the depth of the workpiece and
towards the radial distance from the center) are
within 0–25% and 0–15%, respectively. The reason
for the error observed in Figure 10(a) and (b) can
Figure 7. Sectional view of discretized model. be explained by the fact that distribution of the tem-
perature throughout workpiece material under the
temperature greater than or equal to melting tempera- spark was calculated for a portion of workpiece and
ture of soda lime glass (workpiece material). The iso- then got extrapolated asymmetrically in case of 2D
therms in Figure 9(a) and (b) show the formation of a simulation, while in case of 3D simulation, the tem-
crater in the workpiece. The volume of the crater was perature distribution was calculated together. In the
calculated using equation (6) in order to estimate the case of 3D simulation, the higher volume of material
MRR. considered within the sparking zone contributes
The temperatures distribution obtained along the towards absorbing some energy and hence a reduction
radial distance from the center, and along the depth in the estimated temperature could be observed.
from the top surface are drawn as shown in Further, in the present model, the volume under the
Figure 10(a) and (b). The nature of temperature bell curve was considered assuming it to be sum of

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8 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

Table 2. Material properties of workpiece and hydrogen gas.

Properties Soda lime glass Alumina Hydrogen gas

Density,  (kg/m3) 2170 3900 1.333

Thermal conductivity, k (W/m-K) 1.60 26 0.23
Specific heat, Cp (J/kg-K) 670 875 50,000
Melting temperature, Tm (K) 1673 2100 –
Heat transfer coefficient, hc (W/m2-K) 10,000 10,000 –

Figure 8. Isometric view of temperature field plotted for one

spark for the machining data of Table 3.

frustums of cones and hemisphere, while the reference

model18 considered the volume calculated using the
actual normal distribution curve. Consequently,
there exists a volume difference between the two
which could have contributed to the observed errors.
The study on MRR was carried out for two differ-
ent materials—alumina and soda lime glass—and the
comparison have been made between the present 3D
model and 2D model reported by Bhondwe et al.,18
and both were compared with the experimental results
reported by Basak and Ghosh17 with respect to vari-
ation of MRR with electrolyte concentration
(Figure 11(a) and (b)). Basak and Ghosh17 have Figure 9. Isotherms plotted for melting temperature of one
spark: (a) top view; (b) front view.
used a home-built equipment comprising a variable
full-wave rectified DC supply of frequency 100 Hz
for their experimental work. A digital storage oscillo-
scope was used to monitor the voltage and current a full-wave rectified DC supply while the latter had
wave-shapes. The gravity-fed mechanism was used used pulsed voltage supply. The major drawback of
to maintain vertical feed with constant contact pulsed voltage machining is the reduced material
between the tool and the workpiece (Table 3). removal rate. However, the use of pulsed voltage
The nature of MRR variation with concentration results in higher machining quality, higher reproduci-
of NaOH electrolyte during machining of soda lime bility of the machining, and lower thermal damage.
glass and alumina using present simulation and the These effects were attributed to the fact that the cool-
MRR simulated by Bhondwe et al.18 are shown in ing during pulse-off time also reduces the area of the
Figure 11(a) and (b). The simulated values of MRR heating zone. But the profile of MRR obtained by the
using present simulation have some differences from authors with 3D simulation is approximately same as
the simulation results of Bhondwe et al.18 The differ- the experimental values reported by Basak and
ence between the results is due to the difference in Ghosh.17 The little difference as can be seen in
power supply used for the ECDM process by the Figure 11(a) and (b) is due to the assumptions made
authors and Bhondwe et al.18 The former had used for energy partition, ejection efficiency, and spark

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Goud and Kumar Sharma 9

Figure 10. Temperature distributions in the workpiece for the machining data of Table 3: (a) along the depth from top surface at the
center of spark; (b) on the top surface along radial direction from the center of spark.

Figure 11. Comparison between 2D simulation, 3D simulation and experimental values of MRR for varying electrolyte
concentration: (a) soda lime glass; (b) alumina (Al2O3).

Table 3. Machining data taken for analysis of soda lime glass MRR can be explained by the fact that as the concen-
and alumina (Al2O3). tration increases, the critical voltage and critical cur-
rent also increase. As the critical current increases, it
Parameters Soda lime glass Alumina (Al2O3)
results in the accelerated electrolysis process that pro-
V (V) 21 21 duces a greater number of hydrogen bubbles. The
I (A) 2.3 2.3 phenomenon of the increase in generation of hydro-
C (wt%) 20 20 gen bubbles implies an enhanced rate of sparking and
k (W/mK) 1.60 26 hence higher MRR. Beyond 45% of electrolyte con-
R (mm) 150 150 centration, the specific conductance of the electrolyte
Ep 0.2 0.2
decreases that almost nullifies the changes in the volt-
age and current. As a result, the material removal will
Tm (K) 1673 2100
be less at higher concentration due to almost negli-
T0 (K) 298 298
gible increase in the critical current on which the heat
hc (W/m2-K) 10,000 10,000 energy developed from the spark depends. Similar
Cp (J/kg-K) 670 875 trend can be observed with experimental results of
 (kg/m3) 2170 3900 Basak and Ghosh.17
Figure 11(b) shows the comparison made between
the results obtained for alumina using present simu-
radius; the power supply used was same in both the lation, 2D simulation by Bhondwe et al.,18 and experi-
cases (full-wave rectified DC supply). mentally derived MRR by Bhattacharyya et al.26
Figure 11(a) shows that the MRR of soda lime Bhattacharyya et al.26 had indigenously developed
glass, obtained by 3D simulation increases from con- their experimental equipment. They used a pulsed
centration of 10% to 45% at a much higher rate and, DC power supply unit. The power supply unit can
thereafter, the concentration does play a little role to provide a frequency of 50 Hz and an applied voltage
enhance the MRR. The reason behind this increase in ranging from 0 to 200 V. The gravity-fed mechanism

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10 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

Figure 12. Comparison between simulated and experimental values of MRR with respect to applied voltage (workpiece: soda lime
glass): (a) NaOH electrolyte with 35 wt% concentration; (b) KOH electrolyte with 40 wt% concentration; and (c) KOH electrolyte
with 15 wt% concentration.

was used for vertical feed. Again, the profile of MRR

Conclusions
obtained from the simulation data is almost similar to
the experimental results. The differences in simulated In the present work, a 3D FEM simulation model was
MRR values and experimental values in alumina developed, and an attempt was made to study the
workpiece are due to the assumptions made in the variation of temperature distribution in the workpiece
simulation analysis. While machining alumina unlike and the variation of MRR with respect to change in
soda lime glass, specific conductance and the mobility the input parameters like applied voltage and electro-
of ions does not get affected because of its higher lyte concentration. The simulation was carried out for
thermal conductivity with respect to soda lime glass. two different materials—soda lime glass and alumina
It is evident from Figure 11(a) and (b) that the MRR (Al2O3). The major conclusions drawn from the above
for soda lime glass is more than that of alumina. results are given below:
Figure 12(a) to (c) shows the comparison between
the MRR obtained by simulation and experimentally . The results obtained by the 3D FEM simulation
determined MRR by Basak and Ghosh17 for different analysis of ECDM process are matching with the
configurations, when the applied voltage varies. In all experimental results taken from the literature
the cases, it is observed that the variation of trend of under the same machining conditions. However,
MRR (simulated by the present simulation) with there exists a little difference between them due to
change in applied voltage is similar to the trend of the assumptions regarding spark radius, ejection
the experimental results with little difference due to efficiency, energy partition, etc.
the assumptions made for spark radius, ejection effi- . The experimental results confirmed the shape of
ciency, and energy partition. Interestingly, the MRR material removal due to single spark assumed in
in both the studies (simulation as well as experimen- the model.
tal) converges corresponding to the applied voltage of . The results of 3D FEM and 2D FEM simulation
60 V while machining with NaOH. On the other hand, show similar trend with small variation within the
the difference between the two MRRs is observed to acceptable range. The variation is due to different
be the maximum while machining with KOH at the machining conditions as the former had used full-
same applied voltage. The 70 V applied voltage, thus, wave rectified DC supply and the latter used pulsed
appears to be the closest condition with KOH electro- voltage supply.
lyte for the machining conditions in the two studies . Significant increase in MRR takes place when elec-
under consideration. trolyte concentration increases from 10% to 45% for

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Goud and Kumar Sharma 11

soda lime glass. Beyond that, the concentration does 14. Liu JW, Yue TM and Guo ZN. Wire electrochemical
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17. Basak I and Ghosh A. Mechanism of material removal
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with in electrochemical discharge machining: A theoretical
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of model and experimental verification. J Mater Process
this article. Technol 1997; 71: 350–359.
18. Bhondwe KL, Yadava V and Kathiresan G. Finite
Funding element prediction of material removal rate due to elec-
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, trochemical spark machining. Int J Mach Tool Manuf
authorship, and/or publication of this article. 2006; 46: 1699–1706.
19. Wei C, Xu K, Ni J, et al. A finite element based model
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Appendix
channels in electrochemical discharge machining pro-
cess. Appl Mech Mater 2014; 490–491: 238–242. Notation
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experimental investigation of effect of electrolyte solu- C electrolyte concentration (wt%)
tion on material removal rate in ECDM. Int J Eng Res Cp specific heat capacity (J/kg-K)
Technol 2013; 2: 1–8. Ep fraction of energy partition to
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Mach Tool Manuf 2006; 46: 2044–2050. I machining current (A)

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12 Proc IMechE Part C: J Mechanical Engineering Science 0(0)

k thermal conductivity (W/m-K) T0 ambient temperature (K)

qg heat flux generation (W/m3) t time (s)
R radius of spark (mm) td spark duration (s)
r 0, z0: intercepts of the isotherm and coor- V applied voltage (V)
dinate axes (mm) Vm crater volume (mm3)
T temperature (K)  mass density (kg/m3)
Tm melting temperature (K)

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