Citation: HUANG, L., KINNELL, P. and SHIPWAY, P.H., 2015. Removal of heat-formed coating from a titanium alloy using high pressure waterjet: Influence of machining parameters on surface texture and residual stress. Journal of Materials Processing Technology, 223, Additional Information:• This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Journal of Materials
AbstractTitanium alloys are widely used in aerospace and medical industries owing to high strength to weight ratio and outstanding corrosion resistance. A problem for titanium or titanium alloys is the existence of a hard, brittle and oxygen-enriched layer on the surface (so called alpha case) which is usually formed during hot forming processes or after long-term service at elevated temperatures in an open-air environment. With the development of waterjet system, high pressure waterjet has shown its capability for the removal of such hard and difficult-tomachine coatings. Waterjet machining is usually associated with a surface roughening effect due to the repetitive impacts of droplets. Surface roughening is unwanted for most of aerospace applications as rough surface is detrimental to the fatigue behavior of components, but is beneficial for medical application where fixation is required (e.g. metal orthopedic implants). An additional benefit of waterjet material removal is that the repetitive droplet impacts may introduce compressive residual stress to the machined surface and subsurface layers. In this study, Ti-6Al-4V with alpha case layer was subjected to plain waterjet over a range of parametric conditions. The completeness of alpha case removal was characterized by the depth of removal. The textured surfaces were quantified in terms of average surface roughness (Ra) and apparent volume for interdigitation (V i ). The magnitude of residual stress of PWJ-machined surfaces was measured using X-ray diffraction (XRD). ANOVA analysis was also conducted to identify the relative significance of machining parameters to the process outputs. It was found that an increase in removal depth results in an increase in the surface roughness as well as the interdigitation volume regardless of machining conditions. A compressive residual stress (-563 MPa~ -13 MPa) was found within all PWJ-machined surfaces. It was concluded that a maximum compressive residual stress simultaneous to a