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Design and Development of an Electrochemical Spark Micro Manufacturing Equipment

Anjali V. Kulkarni 1 and V. K. Jain 2
1. Centre for Mechatronics, IIT Kanpur, Kanpur, India
2. Mechanical Engineering Department, IIT Kanpur, Kanpur, India

Abstract—To meaningfully meet the intriguing challenges of the product miniaturization, issues must be addressed in the studies of processes useful for microfabrication. The performance of electrochemical based spark process, an advanced machining process used for micromachining has been studied. In order to study the performance of the process, a proper experimental equipment is needed, which should have the precision and accuracy demanded to achieve the micromachining envisaged. The experimental equipment is designed and developed which is modular. The automation is built using the motion control card on LabVIEW platform to have a 4 axes, automated, 2 μm accuracy in x, y directions and 50 μm in Z axis with minimum X-Y table speed of 10 μm/sec and tool feed rate of 10 μm/sec. The equipment has the facility of online measurement of the process current and gap voltage. The measured values can be stored over two I/O channels, which can be used for the transient analysis of the process.

Index Terms—micro manufacturing, ECSMM, online measurements, precision, μm/step, electrochemical spark, automated motion control 

Cite: Anjali V. Kulkarni and V. K. Jain, "Design and Development of an Electrochemical Spark Micro Manufacturing Equipment," International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Robotics Research, Vol.4, No. 4, pp. 368-372, October 2015. DOI: 10.18178/ijmerr.4.4.368-372