Machining Hardened Steel With Ceramic Inserts

Whatever your component or requirements for surface finish find productive insert grades here that can withstand high temperatures and cutting forces and still retain their cutting edges.

Machining hardened steel with ceramic inserts.

Turning inserts and grades for hardened steel. Al2o3 tic composite ceramic commonly known as black ceramic is suitable for machining hardened materials up to 65 hrc. Si3n4 silicon nitride inserts have high toughness and are suitable for machining cast iron generally grey in colour. Ceramic inserts provide an excellent choice for these types of applications.

The shop was cutting 45 rc steel with carbide inserts on a three year old cnc lathe. Pcbn polycrystalline cubic boron nitride is an advanced material that comes as a result of sintering micron cbn powders with various ceramics to create extremely hard and thermally stable cutting tools. Turning hardened steel calls for super hard insert grades. Beyond 55 hrc are materials that include case hardened and most through hardened steels which require extra resistance to flank wear.

To produce just one part the shop was using two carbide inserts indexing each one time four cutting points altogether. Mccarthy recalls one shop owner who hesitated initially when confronted with the speeds hard turning calls for. There are so many different machining tasks that can be efficiently and economically solved with ceramtec s range of cutting materials and indexable inserts for workpieces made of cast iron steel hardened steel and special materials. There are significant process considerations that shops should examine carefully in order to realize performance and tool life expectations from ceramic inserts.

Applying ceramic inserts is not a simple substitution of one cutting tool material for another. Here s a look at some of the ways they are used.