TY - JOUR
T1 - An integrated analysis of productivity, hole quality and cost estimation of single-pulse laser drilling process
AU - Sarfraz, Shoaib
AU - Shehab, Essam
AU - Salonitis, Konstantinos
AU - Suder, Wojciech
AU - Niamat, Misbah
AU - Jamil, Muhammad
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors want to thank the Punjab Educational Endowment Fund (PEEF, Pakistan) and Cranfield University (United Kingdom) for financial support of this research. The authors are also thankful to Mr Masood Habib Ahmed for proofreading this manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© IMechE 2020.
Copyright:
Copyright 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Laser drilling is a well-established manufacturing process utilised to produce holes in various aeroengine components. This research presents an experimental investigation on the effects of laser drilling process parameters on productivity (material removal rate), hole quality (hole taper) and drilling cost. Single-pulse drilling was employed to drill a thin-walled Inconel 718 superalloy plate of 1 mm thickness using pulsed Nd:YAG laser. The experiments were designed using Box-Behnken statistical approach to investigate the impacts of pulse energy, pulse duration, gas pressure and gas flow rate on the selected responses. Multi-objective optimisation was performed using response surface methodology (RSM) based grey rational analysis (GRA) to identify optimal drilling conditions aiming to maximise the MRR and minimise hole taper and drilling cost. The optimal combination of drilling parameters was found as pulse energy of 20 J, pulse duration of 6 ms, gas pressure of 100 psi and gas flow rate of 40 mm3/s. A detailed cost analysis identified labour cost, gas consumption and machine costs as the major cost elements of the laser drilling process.
AB - Laser drilling is a well-established manufacturing process utilised to produce holes in various aeroengine components. This research presents an experimental investigation on the effects of laser drilling process parameters on productivity (material removal rate), hole quality (hole taper) and drilling cost. Single-pulse drilling was employed to drill a thin-walled Inconel 718 superalloy plate of 1 mm thickness using pulsed Nd:YAG laser. The experiments were designed using Box-Behnken statistical approach to investigate the impacts of pulse energy, pulse duration, gas pressure and gas flow rate on the selected responses. Multi-objective optimisation was performed using response surface methodology (RSM) based grey rational analysis (GRA) to identify optimal drilling conditions aiming to maximise the MRR and minimise hole taper and drilling cost. The optimal combination of drilling parameters was found as pulse energy of 20 J, pulse duration of 6 ms, gas pressure of 100 psi and gas flow rate of 40 mm3/s. A detailed cost analysis identified labour cost, gas consumption and machine costs as the major cost elements of the laser drilling process.
KW - cost
KW - hole taper
KW - Laser drilling
KW - material removal rate
KW - multi-objective optimisation
KW - single-pulse
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U2 - 10.1177/0954405420968161
DO - 10.1177/0954405420968161
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85094979869
JO - Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B: Journal of Engineering Manufacture
JF - Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B: Journal of Engineering Manufacture
SN - 0954-4054
ER -