Study of the Batch Production of Micro Parts Using the EDM Process

Fabrication of a stainless steel shadow mask using batch mode micro-EDM

“…Even though the productivity is not in direct proportion to the number of electrodes, it increases with increasing the number of electrodes. When an RC circuit is shared among several electrodes, only one electrode, which is closer to the workpiece surface may fire at any given moment because the pulse timing at each electrode is not independent (Weng and Her 2002). Other problems were observed in using high-aspect ratio electrode arrays.…”

“…However, materials used in electroplating are limited to a few metals such as nickel, copper and their alloys and the process cost is very expensive. On the other hand, micro-EDM can machine any electrically conductive material and fabricate higher aspect ratio electrode arrays than LIGA process (Weng and Her 2002).…”

“…Micro-EDM can produce high-aspect ratio electrode arrays made of all metal and its process cost is also much cheaper than LIGA process. Even though wire EDM can be used for the machining of multi-electrode (Weng and Her 2002), the limit on spacing between electrodes is constrained by the diameter of wire, which is near 100 lm in conventional wire EDM and 20 lm even in specially designed micro EDM (Liao et al 2005).…”

High-speed micro-electro-discharge machining.

“…Again, drilling several holes at once is better than drilling one The final effort toward increasing the throughput of EDM parts again used an array of posts to make an array of holes in the workpiece. This work, however, used a wire-EDM system to machine an array of square posts into the tool electrode (Weng 2002). This research group found that an array of 49 holes could be machined in 31 minutes, while one hole was machined in 2 minutes.…”

Micro-Electro Discharge Machining of Holes and Grooves: AnAssessment of Process Parameters

“…A micro tool of diameter 100µm was fabricated by (WEDG) over which SiC particles are coated by electrophoretic deposition (EPD) and used to polish microholes in quartz with the help of ultrasonic vibration machining (USM) [38].Using Tungsten carbide cylindrical rod of diameter 300µm as tool electrode micro EDM milling was done directly to get desired slots on stainless steel AISI420 avoiding the need to fabricate complex tools separately [39]. Wenget al [40] proposed a micro EDM process using multi electrodes for batch production of micro parts. Here multi electrodes of 16 pieces in 1.5 mm diameter were fabricated by wire-EDM using Tungsten carbide as electrode by adapting electrode rotating mechanism on work plane.Further, this helps to process micro slots in copper plate using positive polarity machining.Uhlmannet al [41] proposed method to machine micro parts in micro-EDM which was act as die for micro structure batch production.…”