Numerical and experimental studies on the temperature field in precision grinding of SiCp/Al composites

During precision machining of SiCp/Al composites, the temperature of the workpiece surface directly affects the machining quality. In this paper, a triangle heat source model was used to calculate the heat flow during grinding of SiCp/Al composites, then, a three-dimensional finite element method was employed to investigate the temperature distribution at different process parameters, i.e., grinding depth and feed speed of the worktable. In addition, the temperature measures using embedded thermocouple were applied to compare with predictions from the thermal model. The results indicate that the grinding temperature predicted by the finite element method agrees well with the experiment data, and the triangle heat source model was suitable for estimating the workpiece temperature of precision grinding.