Creation of high strength bonded abrasive wheel with ultrasonic aided composite plating

Diamond or cBN and Ni are co-deposited on a steel surface by electroless plating to form a single layered abrasive wheel. This wheel is applied to efficiently grind ceramics and hard materials. Moreover, by this electroless plating process, we can easily produce various free form and complex shaped wheels, for high speed machining. It has been observed that, wheel life is affected by the grain wear rate, which itself is a function of projected grain height from the wheel surface and, the bonding strength. However, the higher the projected size, the lower the bonding strength. This can be explained by the possibility of grain coming away. In electroless plating, Ni hardly deposits on ceramic grains. Therefore, surface shape at the grain periphery is not flat-shaped but sink-shaped. In this study, emphasis has been placed on improving wheel life by optimizing projected grain size while maintaining enough grain support. This study is carried out with the aim of achieving higher grain support for the abrasive wheel. The process deposition rate and surface shape at the grain periphery are improved with the application of ultrasonic vibration. The grain periphery of the specimen obtained without ultrasonic vibration (amplitude 0 μm) is sink-shaped. Whereas, that of the specimen obtained with ultrasonic vibration (amplitude 6 μm) revealed an interface with approximately 10 μm embossment at the periphery. In addition, with ultrasonic vibration, the deposition rate increases with vibration amplitude up to the maximum value of 12 μm. The deposition rate is 1.6 times faster than that without ultrasonic vibration.