Research on Modeling and Simulation of Surface Microtopography in Ultrasonic Vibration Spiral Grinding

In order to achieve high efficiency, high quality and low damage machining of hard brittle materials, additional ultrasonic vibrations in the axial and radial directions of workpiece/grinding wheel are applied simultaneously while grinding. The unique property of this technique is the cutting trajectory of abrasive grain is a spiral line. Accordingly, this technique is named as ultrasonic vibration spiral grinding method. Under the interactions of processing parameters and two-dimensional ultrasonic vibrations, the material removal mechanism becomes more complex, as well as the formation process of surface microtopography. Thus, a numerical simulation method of surface formation in ultrasonic vibration spiral grinding is proposed. Based on the geometric mapping relationship between grains and workpiece in ultrasonic vibration spiral grinding, the spiral cutting and motion model of grains is established. The surface formation model of ultrasonic vibration spiral grinding is provided afterward. Consequently, the three-dimensional surface microtopography of conventional grinding and ultrasonic vibration spiral grinding are simulated respectively. Then, the influence laws of ultrasonic vibrations on the surface formation process are comparatively analyzed. At last, the simulated surfaces are compared with the experimental grinding surfaces and their microstructures are found to be in the same manner, which proves the validity of this simulation method.