Essential Benefits of Ceramic Carbide Cutting Tools

Cutting tools are back bone of any Machining System. This is because the quality of a finished product main depends upon the quality of the cutting tools used. Machining overall productivity is also dependent upon the performance of cutting tools used. Hence, the choice of cutting tool used by the manufacturer determines the productivity of machining systems. Manufacturers should consider several criteria before eventually buying a cutting tool piece for their machining system.

Different types of Cutting tools used:

The demand of cutting tools is increasing day by day, that’s why suppliers are also working continuously to develop products that can meet the manufacturers' specific requirements. Within the past few years number of materials for cutting tools has been experimented.  

Two main types of cutting tools favored in the machining industry are:

              1.      High speed steel (HSS)

              2.      Carbide cutting tools

Out of these two, the carbide cutting tools have overtaken the popularity. There are several benefits of carbide cutting tools. Hence it is important to first understand the carbide material and how this material has become essential cutting tool.

Introduction to Carbide:

Carbides are any group of compounds made up of carbon along with and one other element such as silicon or boron. Some of the popular carbide includes:

              1.      Calcium Carbide

              2.      Aluminum Carbide

              3.      Silicon Carbide

              4.      Tungsten Carbide

              5.      Iron Carbide

Cutting tool carbides are of two types

              1.      Cast-iron carbides: The cast-iron carbides are made from cutting cast iron resources. One of the most essential properties of these carbides is abrasive wear resistance. This protects the cutting tool from edge wear due to the high abrasiveness of cast-iron.

         2.      Steel-grade carbides: Steel-grade carbides are made to resist cratering and heat deformation. These are made up of long chips of steel with higher cutting speeds.

The main carbide material used by the manufacture is by Machining Silicon Carbide with a cobalt binder. Silicon carbide is well known for its hardness and resistance to abrasive wear. Cobalt is used to strengthen the tool's surface topology.

Apart from Silicon Carbide and cobalt, other essential carbide cutting tool materials are titanium carbide and tantalum carbide. Titanium carbide cutting tools helps to resist cratering. On the other hand, tantalum carbide can reduce heat deformations. These are commonly used cutting tools in the industry.

Benefits of Carbide Cutting Tools:

              1.      Inbuilt material Toughness

              2.      Exceptional resistance to abrasion

              3.      Advanced wear resistance behavior

              4.      High Resistance towards cratering

              5.      Resistance to thermal deformations

              6.      Very High modulus of elasticity

              7.      Better Machining Silicon Carbide  products

              8.      Greater torsional strength

              9.      High Compressive strength

              10.  Greater Chemical inertness

Few other basic carbide materials are titanium carbide, titanium nitride, ceramic coating, diamond coating or titanium carbonitride. The different coating materials aid the carbide cutting tool differently. However, these are generally used to further strengthen the cutting tool.