Development of Conductive Rubber-Bond Wheel by ELID Grinding(Nanoprecision Elid grinding)

Abstract

In the aim to fabricate high quality ground surfaces efficiently by ELID grinding, investigations were conducted on the grinding system, grinding wheel, grinding fluid, and electrolytic power supply system. As part of this study, we developed a conductive rubber-bond grinding wheel for ELID grinding. The grinding wheel is composed of rubber, carbon, and abrasives, and was designed to demonstrate ELID effects (continuous grinding ability) by the excellent finishing effects of rubber and conductivity ensured by carbon. The prototyped grinding wheel was a #120 conductive rubber-bond grinding wheel using Al_2O_3 abrasives. Using this wheel, the electrical dressing characteristics and grinding characteristics were investigated. The experimental results show that a non-conductive coating was formed on the wheel surface by electrical dressing, and this coating has greater frictional coefficient and wear amount than the bonding matrix. Grinding experiments of mono-crystalline silicon were also carried out using this grinding wheel, and it was found that stable grinding without loading can be realized by adding ELID grinding.