Creep-feed grinding of nickel-based superalloy GH4169 spline using micro-crystalline alumina wheels

Nickel-based superalloy GH4169,as a typical difficult-to-cut material,has been widely used in aero-engine components.The micro-crystalline alumina wheel is becoming popular in grinding aeroengine materials due to its excellent performance of self-sharpening.In order to find out the most suitable wheel to manufacture superalloy components,experiments on creep-feed grinding nickel-based superalloy are carried out using SG,5SG and TG abrasive wheels to investigate the influence of abrasive types on grinding force,grinding temperature and surface roughness.The results show that the grinding force and grinding temperature are the smallest when using 5SG abrasive wheel,followed by TG abrasive wheel,then SG abrasive wheel.The surface roughness values are all below 0.3 μm after grinding with the tested wheels.When 5SG abrasive micro-crystalline alumina wheel is chosen to manufacture the superalloy spline specimen,all detected results meet the requirements well.