Revolutionary device makes machining composites as easy as ‘cutting through butter’

Dr Anish Roy. Credit: Image courtesy of University of Loughborough

Researchers have developed a device which could revolutionize the way cutting, drilling and milling is done in manufacturing.

The tool makes working on difficult-to-cut materials like aerospace-grade composites so easy it is like ‘cutting through butter’.

It involves a technique called ultrasonically-assisted machining (UAM), which uses a specially designed piezoelectric transducer working in tandem with a traditional turning, drilling or milling machine.

The device creates ultrasonic vibrations at anything between 20kHz and 39kHz, and the machining technique makes the composite material so ‘soft’ in the area being worked on that much less force is needed from the cutting tool, resulting in less damage, less waste, and a better finish.

“Ultrasonically assisted drilling has shown significant improvements in drilling carbon/epoxy composites with significantly reduced damage in the machined composite.

“This is particularly interesting, as any kind of machining of brittle composites can damage the composite material.

“The challenge is to minimise this and, if possible, completely eliminate damage due to drilling. Ultrasonic drilling has shown excellent damage mitigation with remarkable drilling force reductions.”

The technique is currently being extended into biomedical applications such as drilling holes in bones for orthopedic surgery.

The Latest on: Ultrasonically-assisted machining

[google_news title=”” keyword=”Ultrasonically-assisted machining” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]

via Google News

Seasonal energy storage enables summer heat to be used in winter

The Latest on: Ultrasonically-assisted machining

Medicine and the Machine
on May 4, 2024 at 5:00 pm
Subscribe Now Wisdom From a Scottish GP: The Lost Art of Convalescence The final Medicine and the Machine podcast guest, physician and author Gavin Francis, shares his approach to keeping his ...
Wayback Machine: 5 Alternatives To Try
on April 17, 2024 at 5:00 pm
But there’s good news! There are web archives, like the Wayback Machine, that take “snapshots” of websites at different times. This means they save a copy of the website’s appearance on a ...
New Window Film Blocks Heat-Producing UV Light Without Compromising the View
on April 8, 2024 at 6:42 am
Instead, researchers at Notre Dame's Molecular/Nano-Scale Transport & Energy Research (MONSTER) Laboratory used a quantum computing-assisted machine learning model to determine which elements and ...
What do assisted dying, assisted suicide and euthanasia mean and what is the law?
on March 1, 2024 at 4:13 pm
Campaigner Dame Esther Rantzen also wants Westminster MPs to vote on assisted dying, after a report found some evidence that it had led to better end-of-life care in places where it is allowed.
Electrical Discharge Machining
on August 7, 2023 at 5:00 pm
[Norbert] has been on the path of building his own EDM machine and walks us through the process of generating a spark and its effects on some test materials. Armed with a microscope, a homemade ...
Lego Guitar Is Really An Ultrasonically-Controlled Synth
on January 26, 2023 at 10:54 pm
The phrase “Lego Guitar” can be a stressful one to hear. You might imagine the idea of strings under tension and a subsequently exploding cloud of plastic shrapnel. This build from the [Brick ...
Slippery Slope Or Wise Demise? The Pros And Cons Of Medically Assisted Dying
on October 31, 2022 at 5:00 pm
Gender and generational balance - in countries, companies & couples. Assisted dying is controversial, the national approaches to it diverse, and the voices raised both in favour and against it ...
Assisted Suicide
on March 24, 2022 at 7:58 pm
Physician-assisted suicide, also known as aid-in-dying or simply “assisted suicide,” is a decision made in collaboration with a medical professional to deliberately end one’s life.
Machining 101 — What is Grinding?
on July 2, 2021 at 5:00 pm
On its surface, grinding seems simple: a machine takes a rotating tool (usually a wheel) with abrasive grains and applies it to a workpiece’s surface to remove material. Each grain is its own ...
machine learning
on March 12, 2019 at 12:14 pm
WIRED is where tomorrow is realized. It is the essential source of information and ideas that make sense of a world in constant transformation. The WIRED conversation illuminates how technology is ...