Effect of vegetable oils as cutting fluid on wear of carbide cutting tool insert in a milling process

This research focusses on the effect of vegetable oils, i.e. crude palm oil (CPO) and coconut oil (CO), used as the cutting fluid on the wear of carbide cutting tool insert in a face milling process. The performances of the tool, in term of wear and the surface roughness of the workpiece, were investigated and compared to those resulting from a similar milling process but using conventional cutting fluid, which is a commercial soluble oil emulsion (SOE). The results show that at the spindle speed of 360 rpm and the feed rate of 80 mm/min, the tool wear was smaller in the case of CO than that in the case of CPO cutting fluid, which is 0.16 mm² compared to 0.40 mm², respectively. The tool worn area in these cases are still larger than that in the case of SOE, which is 0.09 mm². However, at higher spindle speed of 490 rpm and feed rate of 80 mm/min, the smallest tool worn area occurred for the case of CO cutting fluid, which is 0.04 mm², compared to 0.1 mm² and 0.11 mm² for the case of CPO and SOE cutting fluids, respectively. As for the workpiece, the achieved surface roughness, Ra, were relatively similar for all the evaluated cases.