Development of nano-tools product by tungsten carbide powder nanosized in Thailand

Abstract

The tungsten carbide powder which recycled from the scarps of cemented tungsten carbide, produces the purity of 99%. Using this tungsten carbide powder to manufacture a cutting tool and test its properties are the main objective of this work. Based on the standard SNMG 120408, the cutting tool with the dimension of 12.7x12.7x4.76 is fabricated. With the 100 hours of Ball milling grinding, Cobalt mixing, and sintering at 1430 °C, the experimental result is impressive. At 15% of mixedcobalt, the cutting tool with the hardness of 2031.6 HV be able to cut S45C steel in the feed rate of 0.2 meters per revolution and 45 m/min in the cutting speed. Besides that, it provides the depth of cut of 0.25 mm and when it reaches the cutting distance of 4,200 mm, the surface roughness is 3.65 μm. In comparison with the cutting tool made of imported tungsten carbide powder which has a hardness of 1,254 HV, it turned out that our cutting tool has the equivalent quality in terms of hardness and wear resistance. Hence, this work is considered to be a material development and a tungsten carbide cutting tool manufacture those would be the vital base to lead us to a commercial production.