FEM Simulation of Tool Wear in Drilling

The objective of this study is to simulate tool wear in drilling of nickel-based alloys, in particular Inconel 718. When machining these kind of
materials, the impact of the thermal and mechanical phenomena generated by tool wear on the surface integrity is of prime concern. For this
reason, it important to study the influence of tool wear on tool life, on final part quality and on cutting force and power consumption. Tool wear
is caused by several phenomena (adhesion, abrasion, erosion, diffusion, corrosion, fracture etc.) depending on selected cutting parameters (cutting
velocity, feed rate, etc.). In some cases these wear mechanisms can be described by analytical models which are function of physical quantities
involved in process (temperature, pressure and sliding velocity along the cutting surface).Usually, commercial FEM software allows to implement
these tool wear models but without tool geometry update. To overcoming this limitation, a suitable subroutine considering tool geometry update
was developed and implemented in SFTC DEFORM-3D FEA software to simulate tool wear in drilling of Inconel 718. A good agreement was
obtained between the predicted and measured tool wear data.