Experimental investigation of powder mixed micro-electrical discharge drilling on SS304 substrate

The present work investigates the effect of incorporating molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) powders into the dielectric liquid medium to carry out micro electrical discharge drilling (micro-EDD) on SS304 sheets (1 mm). Different process parameters (i.e., voltage, frequency, and duty factor) are taken into account to explore their performance on the responses such as taper angle (TA), heat affected zone (HAZ), and over cut (OC). Taguchi design of experiments (L9 orthogonal array) is used to conduct the set of drilling experimentation. The results show that the introduction of MoS2 micro-powder in dielectric fluid improved the drilled hole surface quality. The maximum HAZ was found to be at 50 V, duty factor 70%, and frequency of 10 kHz (62.92 µm) without powder.