Novel drill geometries for dry drilling of stainless steel

One completely new geometry and two modified chip breaker geometries were designed to increase the stability and reliability of the stainless steel dry drilling process. Experiments were performed and the results of individual tools were compared with a conventional solid carbide twist drill Gühring Ratio with a diameter of 5 mm. A matrix of three feed rates (0,03–0,07 mm/rev) and three cutting speeds (20–30 m/min) was designed for the cutting conditions. Precipitation-hardenable stainless steel 17-4 PH was chosen as a workpiece. During the experiment, the values of thrust force, spindle torque, temperature of the tool, surface roughness, chips morphology and chips division were recorded and compared with the reference tool. The results showed that compared to the reference tool A, the tool C - a multipoint drill with grooves through the cutting edge achieve approximately 4 % lower values of thrust force and 10–15 % lower values of spindle torque. Tool D with a step drill geometry achieve approximately 17 % lower values of thrust force and 10–15 % lower values of spindle torque and there is no chip clogging in the flute with C and D geometries. This effect is confirmed by the fact the spindle torque basically does not increase with the increasing depth of drilling. Tool B – new designed geometry achieve approximately 15 % lower values of thrust force and similar spindle torque values as the reference drill A. Tool temperature is a very important factor when dry drilling. Compared to the reference drill A, it was possible to achieve the tool temperature reduction of 20 % with the new geometry B, as well as with the multipoint drill C reduction by 26 % and with the step drill D reduction approximately by 30 %. All the modified drills also achieved a reduction in the surface roughness of the drilled holes. By 17 %, 35 % and 48 % lower surface roughness Ra was achieved with drills B, C and D. Chip morphology was significantly different for the tested drills. Conventional twist drills A and B generated helical short chips. While C and D twist drills with divided cutting edges generated ribbon snarled chips. Thanks to the reduction of cutting forces and temperature, it is possible to stably operate the drilling process with a higher cutting speed and feed rate, which leads to an increase in the efficiency and reliability of the machining process.