| Micro-structured surfaces are assuming an ever-increasing role since they define the ultimate performance of many industrial components and products. The bottlenecks for applications of micro-structured surfaces are the manufacturing difficulties in achieving both high efficiency and low cost. An innovative vibration-assisted machining method for fast generation micro-structured surfaces is proposed. The proposed process, referred to as elliptical vibration texturing, adds a higher order motion component to the cutting tool that leads to periodic changes in the cutting depth during the machining process. This results in the creation of micro-textures on the machined surface, whose shape is a function of the tool geometry and trajectory. The most promising features of the proposed method are its high efficiency, low cost, and scalability for mass production.;The development of the proposed process is composed of three interwoven tasks. Firstly, a resonant-mode tool vibration generator that can deliver the required elliptical trajectory at an ultrasonic frequency is designed and optimized. Secondly, a process simulation model is presented to study the surface generation mechanics including the minimum chip thickness and plowing effects. The process is the further extended to create channels and grid patterns by selecting proper combinations of the process parameters. Finally, the developed process is applied to the creation of different micro-structures for surface wettability control. |
