LAUSR

Drilling in synthetic fiber-reinforced polymer composites is facing challenges due to their anisotropic, inhomogeneity, and abrasive machining behavior. The joining of composite parts using fasteners is commonly done by the drilling, and the generated heat is one of the main causes to damage the drilled hole in the composite. Moreover, the quality of drilled hole is crucial for joining parts effectively. The paper presents the design, fabrication, and drilling of a hybrid fiber-reinforced polymer (HFRP) based on insulative coating. These composites were fabricated using vacuum infusion molding (VIM) and coated with different thicknesses to investigate the influence of drilling parameters and associated damages. Cutting speed, feed rate, and coating thicknesses were varied, and a full factorial design of the experiment was formulated. High-speed steel (HSS) twist drill bit was used to drill the coated composite and test samples, and delamination factor and surface roughness were measured. ANOVA and full factorial response optimizer were used to evaluate the influence and optimum drilling parameters. The delamination factor (DF) at the entry and surface roughness were found to decrease with the increasing cutting speed. However, the DF at the exit showed the opposite. Coating thickness influenced the delamination at the entry whereas delamination at the exit has been found insignificant. For drilling HFRP composite with 1 mm coating thickness, 3000 RPM spindle speed and 0.08 mm/rev feed rate were found optimum parameters in minimizing surface roughness and delamination damage. However, 6000 RPM and 0.02 mm/rev were found optimum parameters for drilling HFRP composite with 1.5 mm coating thickness.