The Wear Mechanism of Coated Cutting Tools During Machining Process under the Thermal Effect

Abstract

To figure out the wear process of ZrN-coated cutting tools under the thermal effect, this study performed wear experiments on ZrN-coated cutting tools during the machining process and tested on their hardness, elastic modulus, and microstructures under the thermal effect; then, the paper analyzed the internal laws and mechanisms of factors that cause wear to the ZrN-coated cutting tools under high temperature conditions, and determined their damaged state under certain load and speed conditions. After that, this paper summarized that the wear of ZrN-coated cutting tools during use can be divided into three stages: the running-in stage, the normal wear stage, and the acute wear stage. Through experiments, it’s found that the friction coefficient and wear rate of uncoated cutting tools were significantly higher than those of coated cutting tools; with the increase of load and rotate speed, the friction coefficient showed a decline trend; as the load increased, the wear rate showed an increase trend; as the rotate speed grew, the wear rate decreased; under the condition of a same kind of substrate, the friction reduction and anti-wear effect of cutting tools with a transition layer was better than those of cutting tools without a transition layer.