Ford Motor Company Limited

Charles O McHugh

Duane J Schmatz

John S Badgley

Robert C Petrof

An iron-based cutting tool, useful for machining aluminum-based workpieces at surface speeds at or in excess of 1000 sfm, is fabricated by (i) removing surface impurities from the surface of the cutting tool which will be exposed to crater wear during such machining, the removal being by sputtering or ion bombardment using the surface as a target thereby resulting in a cleansed activated surface; and (ii) depositing a single-phase crystal film of sputtered silicon carbide onto the cleansed activated surface. The activation of the surface in step (i) is carried out by causing ionized argon to be accelerated against the surface maintained at about zero bias and the depositing of step (ii) is carried out to cause silicon carbide to be condensed onto the activated surface as a result of being dislodged from a silicon carbide target maintained at about zero bias for at least 300 minutes. The film of silicon carbide has a thickness in a range of about 1-4 microns, and the crystal orientation of such film is amorphous.

Cutting tool for aluminum workpieces having enhanced crater wear

Method of making cutting tool for aluminum work pieces having enhanced

A method is disclosed of determining worn rotary tools during machining operations, comprising: (a) establishing the steady-state dominant tool force level required to (i) carry out a rotary machining operation at a given set of cutting conditions in the abrasive wear regime, (ii) using a known worn rotary tool with a given geometry, and (iii) using a workpiece of given material; (b) supporting another rotary tool of the same given geometry in a holder for being power driven for rotation, the holder having means to impart a signal in response to exceeding a predetermined force level calibrated to be just below the steady-state force level of the worn tool; and (c) while employing the support tool, initiating an automatic tool change in response to any signal imparted by the tool support.

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Dearborn Heights, MI, United States of America

Charles O McHugh